
Qass __ 



COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT 



DEBATES THAT MADE HISTORY 



DEBATES THAT MADE HISTORY 



The Story of 

ALEXANDER CAMPBELL'S DEBATES 

with 

Rev. John Walker, Rev. W. L. McCalla, Mr. Robert Owen, 

Bishop Purcell and Rev. Nathan L. Rice. 



By J^"J. HALEY 

Author of '^Makers and Moulders of the Reformation Movement." 



Christian Board of Publication 

1920 

Saint Louis, Missouri 




13^^ 



0^\^3 



Copyright, 1920, 

CHRISTIAN BOARD OF PUBI^ICATION, 

ST. IvOUlS, MO. 



m 2U 1921 
©CI.A617410 



it 



OFFERED BY THE 

AUTHOR AND PUBLISHERS 

AS A 

MEMORIAL AND APPRECIATION 

OF 

THOSE VALIANT CHRISTIAN LEADERS OF YESTERDAY 

WHO CONTENDED EARNESTLY WITH EACH OTHER 

IN 

QUEST OF THE TRUTH 

AND AS A 

SERVICE TO THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES OF TODAY 

AND 
ESPECIALLY TO THE YOUNGER MINISTERS 

UPON WHOSE SHOULDERS HAS FALLEN 

THE MANTLE OF CHRISTIAN LEADERSHIP 

AT ONE OF THE MOST CRITICAL PERIODS 

OF CHRISTENDOM 



HISTORIC BACKGROUND 

THIS book is an analytic story of five religious debates 
held in Ohio and Kentucky about a century ago. They 
traverse a w^ide range of topics and cover practically all the 
disputed points between the different Protestant bodies, the 
contentions between materialism and Christianity and the 
divergent issues between Roman Catholicism and Protestant- 
ism. The century that has elapsed since they agitated the 
religious folk has seen many changes in religious thought. 
The point of view has shifted from the ecclesiastical and phil- 
osophical to the scientific and social. New sects have been 
born and grown to strength and others have risen only to die. 
The Christian horizons have been enlarged from township 
scope to world inclusions, but the principles of these debates 
have not been outgrown nor become obsolete. 

It is believed that these discussions have a mission to this 
age of rather loose religious thinking and statement. What- 
ever could be said, pro and con, on the contested ideas was 
stated by men of learning, character, spirituality and forensic 
ability. These debates commanded the attention of the lead- 
ers of their day both in the religious and political spheres. 
They strengthened the love of the truth and fired the passion 
to place Church and State on foundations in which no flaws 
could be found, which would stand the utmost hammering of 
their bitterest foes. 

They also hastened rather than retarded Christian union. 
After they were over men understood Christianity better than 
before and realized that with all their seeming differences 
they were closer together than had been supposed. The dis- 
putants found themselves able, not only to speak of each 
other with respect, but between some of the protagonists in 
these historic contests, there grew up a genuine personal 
friendship. 

7 



8 Historic Background 

These learned arguments quickened interest in religion in 
general. They kindled a new zeal for spiritual things. Tidal 
waves of evangelism rose again and again, and swept many 
thousands into the kingdom of God. Everybody took a fresh 
interest in the Bible and, at no other period of our history, 
have men been so familiar with the Divine Scriptures. Church 
members carried the New Testament in their pockets and 
were ever ready to proclaim and defend its doctrines. Mul- 
titudes ceased to be negative and neutral and became positive 
and aggressive confessors of the faith. 

Religion in America, especially in the South and Central 
West, was at that time, almost entirely of the emotional type. 
The Written Word was a dead letter or was used by the 
masses like a talisman or a dream book. People were taught 
to wait for "experiences'* that would revolutionize their spir- 
itual natures in a moment as evidence of true conversion. 
They must see sights, dream dreams, be warned by signs or 
portents. The religious phenomena of the times are worthy 
of deep study but it can be very confidently affirmed that if 
religion had not somehow obtained a firm footing in reason, 
as well as in feeling, superstition, social anarchy, and, eventu- 
ally, atheism would have swept the people into the vortex of 
despair and pessimism. It was the right moment, therefore, 
for something to come which would put personal religion on 
the basis of fact and objective revelation, and give the peo- 
ple intelligent interest in the spiritual life and impel them to 
love God with the mind as well as with the heart. 

Perhaps the debate which dealt with the most fundamental 
and far reaching questions was that with Mr. Owen. It was 
a very large factor in saving the Mississippi Valley from 
materialistic communism with all the evils it w^ould have re- 
leased from the bottomless pit of lust, greed, selfishness and 
ambition upon that rich and fair section. 

When Mr. Owen appeared in America and challenged the 
ministers to defend their views in public debate, there were 
already in existence a number of communities which prac- 
ticed free love and advocated that the builders of society go 



Historic Background 9 

'^back to nature'* for foundation and guidance. This had been 
heeded to the extent that in some localities according to report, 
the sexes bathed together unclothed in public places. Such 
towns as ''Memnona/* ''New Harmony," and ''Modern 
Times, '* all affecting to cure the poverty, unhappiness, and 
unrest of mankind by the abolition of all kinds of restraint, 
had sprung up in the Ohio Valley. "New Harmony" was 
Robert Owen's experiment and attracted the attention, if in- 
deed not the adherence also, of many of the intellectuals of 
that day. "Memnona" was described in a story called "Es- 
peranza" which means Land of Hope. The book was said to 
be a very bold defense of free love. "Modern Times" was a 
small community at Tuscarawas, Ohio. The social basis of 
the village was expressed in the phrase "individual sovereign- 
ty." In his "Autobiography, Memory and Experiences," Vol. 
1, page 266, Daniel Moncure Conway, the celebrated news- 
paper correspondent, describes marriage in the village of 
"Modern Times" as follows: 

The arrangements of marriage were left entirely to the individ- 
ual men and women. They could be married formally or otherwise, 
live in the same or separate houses, and have their relation known 
or unknown. The relation could be dissolved at pleasure without 
any formulas. Certain customs had grown out of this absence of 
marriage laws. Privacy was general ; it was not polite to enquire 
w^ho might be the father of a newly born child, or who was the 
husband or wife of any one. Those who stood in the relation of 
husband or wife wore upon the finger a red thread ; so long as that 
badge was visible the person was understood to be married. If it 
disappeared the marriage was at an end. 

In addition to the individualistic and free love aspects of 
these communities they were strongly atheistic and their doc- 
trines poisoned many of the leaders of the day. The times 
called for such debates and they came. And, though they 
did not at once nor wholly destroy the errors and evils that 
called them forth, they were a large, if not the largest, in- 
fluence in saving the education and ideals of the growing 
West to the religion of Jesus Christ. 



10 Historic Background 

These debates made history, not because the peculiar tenets 
or claims of one party were advanced as against another, but 
because the doctrines and principles of real Apostolic Chris- 
tianity were reasserted and made vital in the young Republic 
which was neither far enough away from the old order of 
Europe, nor clear enough in its own definitions, nor yet suf- 
ficiently strong in its achievements to be perfectly secure. It 
was still pioneering, especially in religion, and these debates 
of masterful men made the creative power of Apostolic 
Christianity a major force in the thinking of the people and 
put the torch of truth into their hands. 

The light is still burning and the people are going for- 
ward in the long and checkered march of progress. But it 
has come to pass that we are in the welter of world con- 
fusion. Gross materialism threatens the life of the nations. 
Hence there is a new service for these debates. There is 
dense ignorance of the Scriptures. A new order is struggling 
to be born. We are pioneering again — this time on a vaster 
scale. 

All who read this story of those celebrated debates will 
find values worth their time and labor, for they set forth in 
strong firm lines the old, eternal principles that guide souls 
aright, and that will still abide when the mountains are worn 
down with age and men have found the quest of all their 
debates in the answer of the Infinite. 

B. A. Abbott. 

Editor of T/ie Christian-Evangelist. 



TITLES OF CHAPTERS 

I. Introductory: Alexander Campbell as 

A Debater 13 

11. First Debate of the Big Five: Baptism 23 

III. The Second Debate: The War Against 

Sectarianism and Disunion .... 33 

IV. McCalla Debate Concluded .... 45 

V. Third Debate: Conflict Between 

Christianity and Infidelity ... 57 

VI. Robert Owen and His Social System . 67 

VII. The War on Skepticism 77 

VIII. The Great Twelve-Hour Speech . . 87 

IX. Mr. Campbell's Third Argument in 

THE Campbell-Ow^en Debate ... 97 

X. Campbell-Owen Debate Concluded . 107 

XI. The Campbell-Purcell Debate on the 

Roman Catholic Religion . . . . 117 

XII. Origin of the Debate, with Appraise- 
ment 123 

XIII. The Campbell-Purcell Debate: Mor- 

als AND Doctrine 133 

XIV. The Campbell-Purcell Debate: Origin 

OF THE Papacy 143 

11 



12 Titles of Chapters 

XV. The Campbell-Purcell Debate: Moot 

Questions of History 153 

XVI. The Campbell-Purcell Debate: Real 

Apostolic Succession 163 

XVII. The Campbell-Rice Debate .... 173 

XVIII. The Campbell-Rice Debate '^Mode'* 

AND ''Action'' of Baptism 185 

XIX. The Campbell-Rice Debate: Purpose 

OF Baptism 197 

XX. The Campbell-Rice Debate: The Holy 

Spirit 209 

XXI. The Campbell-Rice Debate: Human 

Creeds and Christian Union . . . 221 

XXII. Campbell-Rice Debate Concluded . .231 

XXIII. Aftermath of the Great Debates . . 241 



CHAPTER I 
ALEXANDER CAMPBELL AS A DEBATER 

The Ethics of Religious Controversy a Hundred Years Ago. 



Campbell was decidedly the fairest man in debate I 
ever saw, as fair as you can possibly conceive. He 
never fought for victory, like Dr. Johnson. He seemed 
to be always fighting for the truth, or what he believed 
to be the truth. In this he differed from other men. 
He never misrepresented his case nor that of his op- 
ponent; never tried to hide a weak point; never quib- 
bled. He would have made a very poor lawyer, in the 
ordinary understanding of the term lawyer. Like his 
great friend, Henry Clay, he excelled in the clear state- 
ment of the case at issue. No dodging with him. He 
come right out fairly and squarely. He was what used 
to be called, in good old times, "flat-footed." Rather 
than force a victory by underhand or ignoble means, 
he preferred to encounter defeat. But whenever he 
fell, he fell like the Cavalier Bayard, with honor and a 
clear conscience. 

— Bishop Purcell. 



CHAPTER I 
ALEXANDER CAMPBELL AS A DEBATER 

THEOLOGICAL polemics was as unpopular a hundred 
years ago, amongst the better type of evangelical Chris- 
tians, as it is today. The attitude of the mystic, the pietist, 
and of practical people, who put the supreme emphasis of reli- 
gion upon ethics, towards religious war, or theological combat, 
more properly speaking, has always been that of emphatic dis- 
approval. Spirituality and morality are not debatable ques- 
tions. Controversial religion is the interpretation of religion 
in terms of the intellect, and quickly degenerates into rational- 
ism on the one hand or legalism on the other. The religion 
of Jesus Christ does not place its fundamental accent on J 1 
dogma, creed, ritual, rite, ceremony, orders of ministry, or * 

forms of organization ; it is tovv^ards these externalisms in the- 
ology and ecclesiology that religious disputes invariably gravi- 
tate. This causes people to fight over forms and phrases, prep- 
ositions and propositions in sublime forgetfulness of the mean- 
ing of the religious life, of which forms and phrases are but 
the symbols. This divine religion which originated in the per- 
sonality of Jesus of Nazareth, placed its sovereign impress and ^ 
accent on life, life that found expression in conduct, character, j 
and service. According to this conception of the Christian 
religion the Gospel needed to be proclaimed and practiced, 
not debated. 

This, in brief, is substantially the attitude towards religious 
controversy occupied by both Thomas and Alexander Camp- 
bell, when they commenced their work in Western Pennsyl- 
vania 110 years ago. In the year 1820, ten years later, much 
against his inclinations, and just as much against his convic- 
tions he was persuaded to engage in a ''dispute," as it was 
then called, with the Rev. John Walker, a combative minister 

IS 



16 Debates That Made History 

of the Seceder denomination of Presbyterians. Mr. Camp- 
belFs easy triumph over his opponent in this initial effort in 
the new field, his masterly vindication of his position in the 
eyes of all but the most blinded partisans, the tremendous 
sensation produced by the polemic genius of this new apostle 
of religious leadership, the marked enhancement of his repu- 
tation as thinker, speaker and reformer, could hardly fail to 
suggest to others, and to his own inner consciousness that he 
had found himself in a new field of influence and power, in 
the work to which he had set his hand. The most notable 
conversion resulting from that discussion with Mr. Walker 
was the disputant who had been dragged into it against his 
will, and almost against his principles, who became profoundly 
and movingly convinced, not only of the legitimacy and utility 
of the controversial method, but of its absolute necessity, under 
the circumstances, as effective propaganda, in the interest of 
the current Reformation, of which he was the acknowledged 
leader. The demonstration began its career of fruitage at 
once. 

This first effort in the field of oral controversy captured 
the Baptist community, horse, foot, and dragoon. It was over- 
whelmed with joy at the able, cogent, and most illuminating 
defense and vindication of Baptist principles and practices. 
Amongst other results of this victory over his Presbyterian 
opponent, was an opportunity to visit Kentucky three years 
later, where he found a large body of intelligent and pro- 
gressive Baptists. He preached to great audiences in many 
towns, who listened with rapt and appreciative attention and 
admiration to the great, new prophet and preacher, who had 
so suddenly appeared in their midst. During this first in- 
vasion of the dark and bloody ground, brought about by a 
public discussion in Ohio, he secured 5,000 new readers for 
his paper, the Christian Baptist , including the most enlightened 
preachers and the best educated laymen in the Baptist Israel 
of that section of the country. Hundreds of these, including 
Raccoon John Smith, and thousands of others, afterwards 



Alexander Campbell as a Debater 17 

came into the Reformation. This first effort to extend his 
horizon, and to follow his star of empire towards the West, 
brought to Mr. Campbell's attention the similar revolution 
of Barton W. Stone, which after ten or twelve years of mutual 
acquaintanceship, fellowship and negotiation, gave to the world 
the first exhibiton of the practice of Christian Union, ac- 
cording to the Declaration and Address by Thomas Campbell. 
If a tree is to be known by its fruit, according to the prag- 
matic philosophy of Jesus, this was an encouraging demon- 
stration of the virtue of debating the truth as a means of its 
rapid and effective propagation. Years later v/hen Mr. Camp- 
belFs theory of the utility of controversy had been amply jus- 
tified by results, he published an editorial in the Millennial 
Harbinger in which he gives his reasons for his change of 
mind in relation to the public discussion of religious questions. 
He was quite free, of course, to admit the great evils that 
flowed from the abuses of controversy and the controversial 
spirit. The old darky's traditional announcement of his read- 
iness for ^'spute" as he emerged from the waters of immersion, 
was a dead give-away of the environment from which he had 
received his polemic baptism. Half baked theological Eph- 
raims sprang into the arena, brandishing their crude sectarian 
clubs, as degenerate in logic as they w^ere in life, ready and 
more than willing to prove themselves orthodox by apostolic 
blow and knocks, or in any other way that came most readily 
to hand. Negroes even, and a type of white men of only a 
slightly higher species of the genus homo, as far as gray matter 
and culture were concerned, met at blacksmith shops, country 
stores and churches at the cross roads to discuss baptism, 
creeds, hereditary total depravity, and the abstract influence 
of the Holy Spirit in conversion and sanctification, reminding 
one of a later historic episode in the field of American politics, 
in which the same class of men debated free silver and the 
doctrine of ^'sixteen to one," believing in the bottom of their 
dear precious souls that the new dollar would be absolutely 
free and that we would have sixteen dollars where we had 



18 Debates That Made History 

one before! Thus when controversy simmered down from 
the masters to the masses and began to infiltrate their poor 
thin souls with its stains and colors, ignorance was not sensi- 
bly diminished; dogmatism, which Douglas Jerrold said was 
puppyism come to maturity, partisan prejudice, sectarianism, 
fanaticism, bigotry and bitterness, all continued to flourish like 
a green bay tree. Mr. Campbell was aware of all this. He 
deplored this unseemly prostitution and degradation of the sa- 
cred function of public debate, which, in the hands of com- 
petent men, is one of the best means of publicity, and the 
vindication of truth and righteousness. 

Notwithstanding the glaring ugliness of this adverse side 
of the picture, the editor of the Harbinger did not hesitate to 
declare as the thesis of the editorial, to which reference has 
already been made, that there could be no progress and no 
improvement without controversy. This is plain enough when 
attention has once been called to the fact. Progress calls for 
growth, growth necessitates change, change brings innovation, 
either by the creation of new things, or the modification of 
old ones. 

All innovations and suggested improvements excite opposi- 
tion and opposition precipitates controversy. All who love 
truth conceive it to be their duty to oppose error, and oppo- 
sition to error is a declaration of war against it. The his- 
toric argument employed is equally conclusive. It arrays the 
great sacramental host of patriarchs, prophets, poets, sacred 
philosophers, apostles, martyrs, confessors, and even the Mas- 
ter himself, as fighters in the holy war, the mighty crusade 
against ignorance, error, sin and death. He begins with 
Moses, the master mind of the race, who long and valiantly 
contended with the Egyptian Magi. He overcame Jannes 
and Jambres in the wilderness. Elijah encountered the proph- 
est of Baal. Job long debated with the princes of Edom. The 
Jewish prophets and the idolatrous kings of Israel waged a 
long and arduous controversy. John the Harbinger, and the 
scribes and Pharisees met in mental and moral conflict. Jesus 



Alexander Campbell as a Debater 19 

and the Rabbis and the priesthood long debated. The Apostles 
and the Sanhedrin; the evangelist and the doctors of divinity; 
Paul and the skeptics engaged in many a conflict; and even 
Michael fought in "wordy debate" with the devil about the 
body of Moses; yet who was more meek than Moses; more 
zealous for God than Elijah; more patient than Job; more 
devout than Paul ; more benevolent than John ? 

In later crises of the Kingdom, when it became necessary 
to make war to end war, our valiant defender of the rights of 
controversy, swings down the historic line from the Apostle 
John to Martin Luther, and the controversial weapon again 
prevails. 

The controversy begun by Luther, not only maimed the power 
of the Roman Heirarchy, but also impaired the arm of political 
despotism. The croiun as well as the mitre, was jeopardized and 
desecrated by his Herculean pen. From the controversy about the 
rights of Christians arose the controversy about the rights of men. 
Every blow inflicted upon ecclesiastical despotism was felt by the 
political tyrants. Religious controversy has enlightened the world. 
It gave new vigor to the mind, and the era of the Reformation was 
the era of the revival of literature. It has enlightened men upon 
all subjects — in all the arts and sciences — in all things, philosophic, 
literary, moral, political. It was the tongue and pen of controversy 
which developed the tiue solar system — laid the foundation of the 
American revolution — abolished the slave trade — and which has 
so far disenthralled the human mind from the shackles of super- 
stition. Locke, Sidney, Milton, and Newton, were all controver- 
sialists and reformers, philosophers, literary, religious and political. 
Truth and liberty, both religious and political, are the first fruits 
of well directed controversy. Peace and eternal bliss will be the 
^'harvest home." Let the opponents of controversy, or they who 
controvert controversy, remember that had there been no contro- 
versy, neither the Jewish nor the Christian religion could have ever 
been established ; nor had it ceased could the Reformation have 
ever been achieved. It has been the parent of almost all the social 
blessings which we enjoy. 

If Mr. Campbell had been writing a few years later, he 
might have extended the era of his observations to the political 
field in the successive revolutions that culminated in the Amer- 
ican constitution, and the democratic experiment that fol- 



20 Debates That Made History 

lowed in the history of the American people. It was the his- 
toric clash between the conflicting political concepts of Thomas 
Jefferson and Alexander Hamilton, embodied and com- 
promised in the constitution, and about as reconcilable as *'per- 
dition and the powder house,*' that finally set the combustibles 
off in the conflagration of a great civil war. We think of 
those mighty intellectual conflicts between such giants of the 
forum as Webster and Haj^ne, Clay and Calhoun, John 
Quincy Adams and Patrick Henry, aristocratic John Ran- 
dolph, descendant of Pocahontas, and the Pennsylvania black- 
smith, who when Randolph sneeringly asked: ''What did 
the honorable member do with this leather apron when he 
came to Congress?'* answered in a piece of democratic repartee, 
seldom equalled, ''I cut it up to make moccasins for the de- 
scendants of Pocahontas." 

We think also, and particularly of the most significant and 
decisive of the political controversies of history, those chain- 
lightning debates in Illinois between Abraham Lincoln and 
Stephen A. Douglas, that resulted in Mr. Lincoln's election 
to the presidency of the United States; the ultimate conver- 
sion of the whole world to Mr. Lincoln's way of thinking, in- 
cluding his masterly opponent, ''The Little Giant," who after 
his inauguration became one of his warmest, and most devoted 
and helpful friends. 

Yes, of the inevitableness and, therefore, the allowability 
of controversy at certain stages of human evolution and in 
particular junctures of progressive experience, there can be no 
reasonable doubt. When the man and the moment come to- 
gether, as they always do when a great providential task is to 
be achieved, something happens. In the early years of the 
19th century the moment arrived, and there God brought in 
his man, and something did happen, the truth had found a new 
champion, and a new opportunity. This new master in Israel, 
a Corj^phaeus in controversial ability, a monarch of all he 
surveyed in the realm of religious knowledge and philosophy, 
was found insisting that the fundamental questions of religion 
and civilization, being the problems of life and death, should 



Alexander Campbell as a Debater 21 

be fearlessly and honestly investigated, ventilated, debated, 
threshed out, sifted and held up to the light and the public 
gaze till the church was made safe for spiritual democracy and 
ethical sovereignty. Alexander Campbell w?ls a man of great 
capacity and personality in many directions. He w^as great 
in the pulpit, great in the professor's chair, great on the tripod, 
great on the lecture platform, great in after-dinner monologues 
in family circles, where some of his most brilliant talks were 
made; but in nothing did he reach up to such heights of sheer 
mastership as he did in those intellectual tournaments called 
debates. His fine mental endowments, his scholarly equip- 
ment, his great reach of mind, the phenomenal quickness and 
nimbleness of his faculties, his affluent and inexhaustible 
wealth of classic and common English, the cumulative re- 
sources of facts and data, always at hand, made him easily the 
first reasoner and the greatest debater of his time. He was a 
dialectic genius of the first water. 

These five debates we are about to study are the greatest 
in the English language, perhaps the greatest in any language, 
and it is no exaggeration of the situation to say that we owe 
the monumental character of these discussions more to the 
sage of Bethany than to any one of his five opponents, or all 
of them put together. If the historic example of dignity, 
courtesy and fairness, set by him, had been followed by others 
who took up the gauntlet in the arena of polemic discussion, 
the alleged evils of controversy would have been negligible. 
He did not regard debating and fighting as equivalent terms. 
On the contrary a debate from his point of view was a 
friendly and brotherly exchange and interchange of ideas with 
a single end in view, viz. : the elicitation, exposition, and vin- 
dication of truth and righteousness. His aim was to speak the 
truth in love, and to bring before a distracted world and a 
divided church, the regenerating and unifying principles of the 
more excellent way so plainly and urgently revealed in the 
word of God. How well he succeeded, we shall see as we 
proceed with the analysis and interpretation of these five of 
the world's greatest debates. 



CHAPTER II 
FIRST DEBATE OF THE BIG FIVE: BAPTISM 

Between Alexander Campbell and the Rev. John Walker 
at Mt. Pleasant, Ohioj June 19 and 20, 1820. Beginning of 
the War against Sectarian Creeds and Divisions, 



When Alexander Campbell was urged in the spring 
of 1820, to engage in a public oral debate with Mr. 
Walker, on the question of Baptism, he at first de- 
clined to consent, ''not regarding," as he said, "pub- 
lic debates" to be ''the proper method of proceeding in 
contending for the faith once delivered to the saints." 
He had adopted this conclusion however, more from 
deference to his father's feelings on the subject, than 
from his own matured convictions of expediency or 
from his natural temperament. 

— Richardson's Memoirs of Alexander Campbell. 



CHAPTER II 
FIRST DEBATE OF THE BIG FIVE: BAPTISM 

IT seemed like the irony of fate that the first great mill on 
baptism, in the 19th century, should be pulled off in a 
Quaker community! Dr. Richardson, in his Memoirs of 
Alexander Campbell, gives us a few felicitous touches of the 
physical and rural environment of the locality in v^hich the 
first great debate was held: 

The place selected was Mt. Pleasant, O., a village some 23 miles 
distant from Mr. Campbell's residence, situated in the midst of a very 
beautiful and fertile country, gently undulating and greatly im- 
proved by the careful culture and industry characteristic of the 
Quaker farmers who constituted a large portion of the surrounding 
population. Comfortable dwellings, rich fields of clover, substantial 
fences, and thrifty orchards greeted the eye on every side, with here 
and there luxuriant groves, or smaller clumps of stately forest 
trees. This region was quite thickly settled, and as considerable 
interest in the subject had been already created, and public polemical 
discussions were at this time quite a novelty, a large and attentive 
assembly was in attendance. 

The rest of the community was, perhaps, about equally 
divided between Baptists and Seceder Presbyterians. Both 
parties were Calvinistic in theology and intensely dogmatic in 
all their religious attitudes. The Secession denomination to 
which both of the Campbells had belonged, was the most 
fiercely intolerant and belligerent of all the narrow-minded 
sects in the Christendom of that day. Thomas Campbell 
tells of a Seceder cleric, a brother minister of his at the 
time, who said to his congregation, *'I beseech you my brethren 
to hate all other denominations, especially the Catholics.'* 

Ecclesiastical secederism was the quintessence of Orangeism 
in the north of Ireland, where the hymn of hate is still sung 
to as many variations as it was a hundred years ago. It was 

25 



26 Debates That Made History 

out of this furnace of sectarian gall, and red handed partizan 
hostility that the Campbells escaped when they came to the 
United States, in the first decade of the 19th century. And, 
they were not long in finding out that they had jumped from 
the frying pan into the fire, and that the fire eating seceder 
was as strongly entrenched in the hills of Western Pennsyl- 
vania, and the Western reserve of Ohio as he had been in the 
political and theological wars on the other side of the Atlantic. 

The moderator, chosen by Mr. Walker, was a secession 
divine who showed but one conspicuous quality before the 
debate began, during the time of its continuance, and after 
its close, and that was the most intense and bitter hostility to 
Mr. Campbell. The reader will have no difficulty in under- 
standing that these seceders *'had it in'' for the Campbells 
on at least three counts. First: these reformers, so called, 
had the effrontery and the audacity to try to reform the 
Cattery at Kilkenny, that is, to bring about peace, unity and 
harmony among the quarrelsome secession-immaculates and 
inf allibles. Second : they left the Seceder denomination when 
they found it bej^ond redemption ; and, third : they went over 
to the vulgar Baptists on the subject of baptism. These were 
unpardonable offenses. These counts made up an indictment 
that meant war to the knife against Alexander Campbell and 
his current reformation. 

In addition to these general grounds of antagonism, a local 
clash in the community of Mt. Pleasant brought things to a 
head. A successful protracted meeting in the Baptist church 
resulted in the immersion of a goodly number of persons, 
some of them seceders, who had been sprinkled in infancy. 
This, although it was a water proposition, put the fat in the 
fire, and soon there was a blaze in the Presbyterian camp. 

The Rev. John Walker, pastor of the village secession 
church, delivered a series of sermons in defense of infant bap- 
tism, and in opposition to immersion, which he declared to be 
without Scripture warrant. There was a Baptist **Chile a 



Baptism 27 

takin* notes an' faith he didn't print 'em," but he called the 
speaker down on a garbled and twisted quotation from one 
of his authorities. This led to a personal dispute and a peremp- 
tory challenge from Rev. Walker to debate the points at issue. 
Alexander Campbell was chosen to represent the Baptists, al- 
though at that time he had no ecclesiastical connection or asso- 
ciation with any existing rehgious party, including the Bap- 
tists. Both he and his father had been immersed by a Baptist 
minister, and this fact had brought them into friendly relations 
with leading Baptists in the neighborhood, who regarded 
them as allies in the war against affusion as a substitute for im- 
mersion and infant rantism in place of believers' baptism re- 
quired by the New Testament. The Calvinistic Baptists of 
the period — iron jackets and hard shells for the most part — 
were little more to the fancy of Rev. John Walker's opponent 
in that discussion at Mt. Pleasant, Ohio, than Calvinistic Se- 
ceder Presbyterians. It was easier to make converts from Bap- 
tists to ^^the ancient order of things" than from paedobaptists, 
on account of agreement on the points to be discussed, and 
many were made; but the objective of the great drive was not 
to clear the field for Baptist occupation. It was a justifiable 
and fitting opportunism in the mind of Mr. Campbell: viz., 
a capital chance to represent the truth on the subject of bap- 
tism, and to open the way for the presentation of larger and 
more vital and fundamental truths, which he was anxious for 
the religious world of his time to hear. 

And so the eventful 19th of June, 1820, arrived and all 
things were ready for the ''dispute" to begin. And there were 
the peaceful, and spiritual, and ethical Quakers of the vicinity, 
who had no forms to fight over; no material sacraments that 
externalized and carnalized religion out of all semblance to the 
divine original, there they were: 'Triends" to God and man, 
who did not believe in war neither carnal nor theological. Did 
any of them attend the debate? History is silent on the sub- 
ject: it is probable, however, that they remained at home, 



28 Debates That Made History 

quietly attending to their business, and waiting for the storm 
in the village to blow over. The battle went on notwithstand- 
ing this silent protest against its ravages; and what was of 
even greater significance, the spirituality of the Quaker, and 
his belief in a religion of life and character, in the union of all 
who love in the service of all who suffer, found a mighty cham- 
pion in one of the disputants, at least, in that theological scrap. 
It was the fundamental aim of the Reformation proposed by 
Thomas Campbell, and seconded by his gifted son Alexander, 
to put an end to strife and controversy over forms, doctrines, 
and theological speculations. It was the conviction of these 
two men that if people would adopt the Bible as the only 
standard of religious truth, and accept the meaning of its 
words as determined simply by the rules of language, its true 
sense would be sufficiently obvious, and there would be univer- 
sal agreement in relation to the things which it revealed. It 
was their hope that religious dissensions might be thus brought 
to a close, and that there would be thenceforward no occasion 
whatever for controversy, except with those who denied the di- 
vine authority of the Bible. 

Rev. John Walker was in no sense a worthy opponent of 
Alexander Campbell, but his acceptance in that capacity was 
the best that could be done under the circumstances. He took 
the affirmative on the subject of infant baptism, made the first 
speech, of course, and it was a sui generis performance. It be- 
trays a strangely rudimental conception of the conduct of a 
public debate. Its phenomenal brevity and its destitution of 
everything in the shape of argument, interpretation, explana- 
tion, or illustration, was absolutely stunning. It is just 124 
words in length, consists of one sentence, printed in twelve 
lines of brevier type, across the page of a book of ordinary 
size, and required not more than two minutes of the reverend 
gentleman^s time to deliver. It is the shortest historic speech 
on record unless it is Sydney Smith's celebrated charity ser- 
mon, where he quotes the text, *'He that giveth to the poor 
lendeth to the Lord," and then added: ^'If you like the security 



Baptism 29 

down with the dust." Smith's little speech was a great suc- 
cess, it brought the dust; but the warmest of Mr. Walker's 
friends could hardly have pronounced his little quip a hit, not 
even in raising dust! But here is Mr. Walker's little speech 
in full: 

My friends, I don't intend to speak long at one time, perhaps not 
more than five or ten minutes, and will therefore come to the point 
at once: I maintain that baptism came in the room of circumcision, 
that the covenant on which the Jewish church was built, and to which 
circumcision is the seal, is the same with the covenant on which the 
Christian church is built, and to which baptism is the seal ; that the 
Jews and the Christians are the same body politic, under the same 
lawgiver and husband; hence the Jews were called the congregation 
of the Lord; and the Bridegroom of the church says "My love" 
**my undefiled one," consequently the infants of believers have a 
right to baptism. 

One **wee" citation from Scripture, six words from the 
old Jewish love-song, known as ''the song of songs" which 
has no more to do with the church of Jesus Christ than 
it has with the man in the moon. This spiritualizing and 
mystifying absurdity was a favorite method of sectarian inter- 
pretation in those days. 

The little assumption that tried to construct a bridge for in- 
fant baptism on the two pillars of baptism in the room of cir- 
cumcision, and the identity of the covenants, furnished only a 
breakfast spell for Mr. C. to demolish. He pointed out, at 
once, the physical and moral impossibility of the material 
and national rite of circumcision, having any relation what- 
ever to Christianity and the Christian church established by 
Christ and the Apostles. He showed that the circumcision 
argument was a desperate makeshift, an after thought, a 
groundless assumption, and that Paedobaptists themselves did 
not put baptism in the room of circumscision, as they did not 
confine it to males only, and extend it to servants as well as 
children, perform it on the 8th day, or make it the identifying 
badge of nationality in a state commonwealth. 

In referring to the glaring points of dissimilarity between 



30 Debates That Made History 

the two institutions, Mr. C. particularized the fact that cir- 
cumcision required only carnal descent from Abraham, or 
covenant relation to Abraham; but that baptism demanded 
faith in Christ as its indispensable prerequisite: and that bap- 
tism differed from circumcision in the nature of the blessings 
it conveyed, which were spiritual and not temporal. When 
Mr. Walker returned to this point, instead of making an effort 
to gather up the shattered fragments of his broken pillar, he 
contented himself with merely repeating the assertion in the 
same words, making no attempt to give Scripture proof or evi- 
dence of any kind. 

The next point was the identity of the covenants, which 
paedobaptists regarded as the stronghold of infant baptism. 
The two covenants were the same, the carnal, temporal, and 
national covenant of the Jewish dispensation, was identical 
with the spiritual and moral covenant made and ratified in 
Christ under the new economy of the Holy Spirit and, there- 
fore, as infants were included in the first they have the right 
of inclusion in the second. This argument, if more compli- 
cated and tortuous, is, if possible, less conclusive than the 
one on circumcision. Mr. Campbell had no trouble in dem- 
onstrating from two inspired writers, Jeremiah the prophet, 
and the writer of the epistle to the Hebrews, that the two 
covenants were contrasted in their provisions, and diametrical 
opposites in all of their essential characteristics. The He- 
brew writer speaks of the new and better covenant which 
had been enacted upon better promises. These better prom- 
ises were promises of eternal salvation beginning in time, 
the basic principles of the better covenant over against the 
promises of temporal preservation in the old. The old cove- 
nant being the basis of a political commonwealth, was full of 
unconscious infants and wicked men, but the new and better 
covenant under Christ had only members of whom it was 
said: *'They shall not teach every man his fellow-citizen and 
every man his brother, saying *know the Lord;' for all shall 
know me from the least to the greatest of them." This neces- 



i 



Baptism 31 

sarily excludes infants. As Mr. Walker used considerable 
repetition, Dr. Richardson tells us, and often recurred to 
his argument on the covenants without considering the refu- 
tation given by Mr. Campbell, the latter employed a portion 
of his time in directing the attention of his audience to some 
of the general principles of the Reformation he was laboring 
to establish: which if admitted, must sweep away the entire 
foundation of Mr. Walker's system. Some of these were: 
the supreme authority of Scripture, and the necessity of a 
positive command for every religious institution, which in no 
case could be based upon mere reasoning or upon human tradi- 
tion. When the two chief pillars of the bridge of infant bap- 
tism, had been razed to the ground, and pulverized, Mr. 
Walker appealed to the four cases of household baptism men- 
tioned in the New Testament, as evidence that infants were 
baptized in apostolic times. The ground was cut from be- 
neath this appeal by a simple reference to the inspired record : 
"All the house of Cornelius feared God and received the Holy 
Spirit: Lydia's household were comforted as brethren. The 
word of the Lord was spoken to all in the jailer's house and 
they all rejoiced believing in God. All the house of Crispus 
believed on the Lord, and all in the house of Stephanus are 
said to have addicted themselves to the ministry of the Saints, 
Now, if these things are affirmed of all the baptized will not 
apply to infants, then it is plain there were no infants bap- 
tized in those houses.*' 

The last appeal of the Seceder champion on this proposition 
was to the antiquity of the practice. He referred to the prac- 
tice of infant baptism in the early church. Mr. Campbell ad- 
mitted that both infant baptism and infant sprinkling were 
ancient practices, but the mere antiquity of an institution did 
I not prove it to be right, since many things introduced in the 
first and second centuries were known to be corruptions. The 
i first of the church fathers to mention infant baptism, was 
i Tertullian who flourished from A. D. 194 to 216, and is 
j ranked among the writers of the third century. And he refers 



32 Debates That Made History 

to the institution with criticism and strong disapproval, and 
saj^s of it, along with other things of similar nature: **If 
you demand a law for these practices taken from the Scrip- 
tures, we cannot find one there, but we must answer that it 
is tradition that has established them, custom that has author- 
ized them, and faith that has made them to be observed.** 
Thus the historic line falls 200 5^ears short of apostolic ground 
and so leaves the foot of Mr. Walker's fourth pillar in the 
mud and sand of human tradition. 

In the afternoon of the second day when the debate on 
the **mode" or action of baptism was to have been commenced, 
Mr. Campbell and the congregation had their breath taken 
away when Moderator Findley proposed, at the instance of 
Mr. Walker, that farther discussion be limited to one speech 
on each side! It was hardly to be expected that the chal- 
lenger and his most rabid official partizan, who had proposed 
that the discussion should go on from day to day till all points 
had been fully discussed should exhibit the white feather 
and call for so cheap an armistice, which the public was bound 
to construe as a transparent acknowledgment of defeat, or a 
vote of a want of confidence in the paedobaptist champion. 
Mr. Campbell consented to close with two speeches on 
each side, on the ground that if it was sufficient for them, it 
was quite satisfactory to him. As this phase of the baptismal 
problem is more ably and exhaustively treated in the debate 
with McCalla three years later, and too much repetition must 
be avoided in these sketches and tediousness altogether elim- 
inated, if possible, we will summarize arguments on the 
*'mode" when we reach the contest with Seceder McCalla, 
which will be in the next two articles of the present series. 



CHAPTER III 

THE SECOND DEBATE: THE WAR AGAINST 
SECTARIANISM AND DISUNION 

The Debate with Rev. Wm. McCalla in Washington, Mason 
County, Kentucky, October 15-22, 1823. 



Washington, Ky. i 

My dear Margaret: Through the mercy and kind- 
ness of our heavenly Father we have arrived in safety 
and in health at the ground of debate. * * * This 
is a healthy and fine country, and everything is cheer- 
ful and animating. I have no news relative to the 
debate. Great expectations on all sides and much zeal. 
Too much party spirit. I hope and pray that the Lord 
will enable me to speak as I ought to speak, and cause 
the truth to be glorified. 

— From a letter of A, Campbell to his ivife on the eve 
of the Camphell-McCalla debate. 



I 



CHAPTER III 

THE SECOND DEBATE: THE WAR AGAINST 
SECTARIANISM AND DISUNION 

THE discussion with the Rev. John Walker in Mt. Pleas- 
ant, Ohio, in the summer of 1820, noticed in the pre- 
vious chapter, was the real beginning of the Reformation 
under the leadership of Alexander Campbell. The idea 
that this movement began in 1809 with the organization of 
the Christian Association in Washington, Pa., and the pub- 
lication of the Declaration and Address by Thomas Camp- 
bell, is one of those historic mistakes, which it is difficult to 
explain, in view of the actual facts of the case. The con- 
ception of a great constructive movement within the church 
looking to its reformation, the correction of abuses, and the 
union of Christians upon the one foundation laid in Zion, 
did not enter into the mind of Alexander Cambpell till the 
dynamic thrust and shock of a great debate, aroused him to a 
consciousness of his power to reach and convince the public. 
Here is an illuminating passage, which I accidentally dis- 
covered in the last chapter of the Christian Baptist, which 
will be news to the Disciples of Christ generally, as it was 
to me: 

Having been educated as Presbyterian clergymen generally are, 
and looking forward to the ministry, as both an honorable and 
useful calling, all my expectations and prospects in future life were 
at the age of 21, identified with the office of the ministry. But 
scarcely had I begun to make sermons, when I discovered that the 
religion of the New Testament was one thing, and that of any sect 
which I knew wa,s another. I could not proceed. An unsuccessful 
eflFort by my father to reform the Presbytery and Synod to which he 
belonged, made me despair of reformation. I gave it up as a 
hopeless effort; but did not give up speaking in public assemblies 
upon the great articles of Christian faith and practice, in the hope, 
the humble hope, of erecting a single congregation with which I 

35 



36 Debates That Made History 

could enjoy the social institutions. I had not the remotest idea of 
being able to do more than this; and, therefore, I betook myself to 
the occupation of a farmer, and for a number of years attended to 
this profession as a means of subsistence, and labored every Lord's 
day to separate the truth from the traditions of man, and to persuade 
men to give up their fables for the truth — with but little success. 

He then goes on to speak of the debate with Walker, and 
adds: 

It was not until after I discovered the effects of that discussion 
that I began to hope that something might be done to rouse this 
generation from its supineness and spiritual lethargy. 

So the historic union movement of the 19th century, which 
has done so much to make spiritual world history, actually 
was originated and initiated in a debate, led by a farmer, who 
had been educated for the ministry! 

Another effect of this discovery was the publication of the 
Christian Baptist two years later which became an instrumen- 
tality in public enlightenment and the dissemination of refor- 
mation principles, not second to any other used by Mr. Camp- 
bell in those early days. The debate with Mr. Walker was 
published in book form and was widely read by the clergy 
both Baptist and paedobaptist and by the intelligentia of the 
denominations on both sides. The immediate effect of the 
publication was a great accession of new friends among Bap- 
tists, whose cause had been so ably and unanswerably vin- 
dicated. The second result, of course, was a smaller host 
of enemies among paedobaptists, whose cause, in this first bat- 
tle of the Marne, had been so mercilessly mauled, followed 
by an intensification of rancor and prejudice in the minds of 
the secession clergy, and the inner circle of church members 
immediately under their influence. 

At the close of the Walker debate, Mr. Campbell, under 
the conviction that a more exhaustive discussion of the points 
at issue, with an abler and better equipped opponent, would 
be conducive to the cause of truth and progress, issued an in- 
vitation to the clergy, as follows: 



The War Against Sectarianism 37 

I this day publish to all present that I feel disposed to meet any 
paedobaptist minister of any denomination of good standing in his 
party, and I engage to prove in a debate with him, either viva voce 
or with the pen that infant sprinkling is a human tradition and in- 
jurious to the well being of society, religious and political. 

This challenge made a profound impression on the public 
mind, in fact, it hammered and heated the clerical brain to 
an unwonted degree of interest and excitement. The feeling 
was coextensive with the circulation of the printed debate, 
especially in the secession denomination, where the most dam- 
age had been effected, that something must be done to re- 
trieve the situation and to stop the advance of a dangerous 
heresy. 

The first thing, and the chief thing, was a prejudice prop- 
aganda commandeered by intolerance and bigotry so char- 
acteristic of the time and the clerical opponents of the new 
reformer. 

The challenge thrown out was accepted by the Rev. Wil- 
liam McCalla, of Augusta, Ky., which led to a lengthy cor- 
respondence extending over several months and getting no- 
where. A great amount of time was consumed, and space 
covered, and not a single preliminary of a public discussion 
had been definitely arranged. McCalla refused to agree to 
any of the propositions suggested by Mr. Campbell, and de- 
clined to suggest any of his own, until his last epistle, in 
which he gingerly accepted the invitation to debate, and agreed 
to discuss the propositions canvassed in the debate with 
Walker. His aim seemed to be in the prosecution of this 
long drawn-out exchange of letters, to set up a theological 
slander mill, for the manufacture of the poisoned gas of dis- 
traction, misrepresentation, and the odium theologicum. He 
flung into the teeth of his correspondent, in the most offensive 
way, all of the villainous stories and slanderous distortions of 
truth which had obtained currency against him in Secession 
circles. He boldly intimated that unless such rumors were 
corrected, *^no minister of a divine Savior could desire any 



38 Debates That Made History 

other intercourse with him than as an adversary/^ To this 
Mr. Campbell replied: 

You have told me that you are to meet me as an adversary — as 
ho-Satanas, Well, I hope that you will remember that when Michael, 
the archangel, disputed with the adversary about the body of Moses, 
he durst not bring against him a railing accusation. As you are 
celebrated for piety and orthodoxy, and I for want of them, a great 
deal will be expected of you and very little of me. 

This ^^minister of a divine Savior,'^ continued his efforts to 
cast odium upon his opponent by invariably referring to him 
as *'the adversary,** ^'the accuser** — ho-SatanaSj up to the sec- 
ond afternoon of the debate, when one of the moderators arose 
and said that Mr. McCalla must know that these are the 
names given in Scripture to satan, who is called the **adver- 
sary** and **the accuser of the brethren.** He thought that Mr. 
McCalla should treat his opponent as a gentlemen and as a 
Christian, although he differed from him on the questions un- 
der discussion. He hoped, therefore, that he would substitute 
the term ^^opponent,** or any term less acrimonious and more 
consistent with candor and justice, in place of those offensive 
terms. 

As Dr. Richardson remarked in this connection: 

It needed one of an intrepid spirit to brave theological odium 
and clerical denunciation, and to rebuke the bigotry, sectarianism, 
and venality which existed in the religious world. It needed 
one, too, of supreme regard for truth and uncompromising fidelity to 
the teachings of the Bible, to exhibit boldly the simple apostolic 
gospel and the primitive church order, in opposition to the corrup- 
tion and spiritual despotism which then prevailed. 

It was the old, old story of the bitter conflict between prog- 
ress and reaction, and the friction it always engenders. We 
have it yet, and every generation that makes any effort to go 
ahead has it. Never since the morning stars sang together and 
all the sons of God shouted for joy have the officials of an in- 
stitution who derived their support from it, been willing to see 
it reformed. 



I 



The War Against Sectarianism 39 

It is always the made-to-order professional who turns re- 
actionary and blocks the way of progress. A man with a great 
head and a democratic heart, free from the shackles of self- 
centered professionalism, must come up from the people, and 
be driven forward by a kind of cosmic impulse, in the name 
of all the people, to successfully knock down official dagon — 
in the temple of conventional religion. Doctors, as a rule, do 
not lead in the reformation of materia medica; lav^ers, except 
in rare individual instances, do not advocate changes or im- 
provements in jurisprudence; and still less do preachers, as a 
class, lead in the reformation of the church. 

Human nature seems to be essentially partisan, especially 
official human nature, and the first function of sectarianism 
is to assume the finality of its opinions, and there is hardly 
a step between finality and infallibility. Any effort, there- 
fore, to change the final or to call in question the infallible, 
is resented as a crime of limitless proportions. It is this partic- 
ular aspect of human psychology that makes the Jordan of 
reformation a hard road to travel. It is well known to nearly 
everybody now, if you want to down a man, you must not 
reason, you must not argue, you must not marshal evidence 
against him ; do not attempt to brain him with the triple club 
of logic, fact and scripture. That would be a great waste of 
time, and your ^'adversary" would be almost certain to win the 
fight. Call him names; make faces at him, sneer, ridicule, 
whisper innuendoes, use the weapons of detraction and mis- 
representation, set a few lies in motion against him and the 
work is done. 

Mr. Campbell foreseeing the efforts of the clergy to poison 
the public mind against him in Kentucky where the debate 
with Mr. McCalla was to be held, withdrew the Christian 
Baptist from circulation in that section, till the close of the 
discussion. He did this to keep the people from being biased 
either one way or the other, until they had an opportunity of 
hearing what he had to say. His supreme desire was an im- 
partial tribunal, a disinterested audience, open-minded and 



40 Debates That Made History 

without prejudice, capable of discrimination and sound judg- 
ment in listening to his presentation of the truth. 

The campaign of prejudice, however, had been getting in its 
work, and the voice of the heresy hunter was heard in the 
land. On the other hand, the increasing warmth of his 
friendship with the Baptists, since the debate with Walker, 
and the union of the Brush Run congregation with the Ma- 
honing Association, had paved the way for a more favorable 
reception of the man and his message. There was also, a 
bunch of intellectuals, usually outside of all the churches in 
Kentucky town communities, lawyers, doctors, teachers, with 
a college-bred farmer, here and there, with brains and cul- 
ture enough to appreciate ability, and to recognize an argu- 
ment when it made its appearance. These were the disinter- 
ested and capable judges of debates that took place in town, 
whether religious or political, and almost without exception 
when Alexander Campbell was one of the disputants, they 
became his most enthusiastic admirers, and sometimes his most 
faithful adherents. 

The long journey of 300 miles from Bethany, West, Va., 
to Washington, Mason Co., Ky., the Ohio river at that time 
being too low for navigation, had to be made on horseback. 
On this toilsome trip, through forests and over mountain roads 
his only companion was Sydney Rigdon, a brilliant and elo- 
quent young Baptist minister, who at that time was as much 
devoted to Mr. Campbell as Boswell was to Johnson; albeit 
he was not as good a Boswell as Campbell was a Johnson, as 
he gave us no record of the brilliant talk which must have il- 
luminated the woods on that long historic journey. Rigdon 
afterwards gained notoriety and immortality of infamy by 
joining the Mormons, and collaborating with Joseph Smith, 
Jr., in transmogrifying the old Spaulding manuscript novel 
into the book of Mormon. The method of this transmogri- 
fication fraud, was the insertion of fragments of Scripture, 
torn from their connections, into the text of the Spaulding 
fiction, giving it the form and archaic flavor of the King James 



The War Against Sectarianism 41 

translation of the Bible and then, by the transfusion into the 
fabric of the story of as much of Mr. CampbelFs theology 
as he could remember. It was this latter fact that gave some 
slight semblance of truth to the charge afterward made, that 
Mormonism was the daughter of Campbellism. It only proves 
that Rigdon, who had been preaching for sometime the world^s 
need of a new religion, had united with a bigger rascal than 
himself, to perpetrate one upon mankind, that both of them 
knew to be a fraud. The only thing Rigdon could appreciate 
was novelty, and his new religion had plenty of that. 

Mr. Campbell speaks of his arrival at Washington and 
adds : 

The preliminaries being settled, the Rev. J. K. Burch, Presby- 
terian, being chosen by Mr. McCalla and Elder Jeremiah Vardeman, 
Baptist, by myself, and these having chosen Judge Roper to preside 
with them, I opened the discussion Oct. 15, 1823, in the presence of 
a very large assembly of citizens, and the clergy of all denomina- 
tions in the country. I appeared as the defendant of the Baptist com- 
munity against their assailant, Mr. McCalla, who had been for some 
time, smoke in their eyes, and thorns in their sides. The counties of 
Northern Kentucky echoed with his praises, as a learned, shrewd, 
and able debater: one who had long practiced various ways of 
assaulting the distinctive tenets of the Baptist community, much to 
the mortification of that denomination, and much to the glorification 
of his own society and the Methodist. This gave to the occasion a 
livelier interest and greatly excited public attention. 

Concerning himself he said : 

I was to the w^hole community a stranger. A few only of the 
teachers and public men had read my discussion with Rev. John 
Walker of the secession church, in Ohio. 

Mr. Campbell's reputation had preceded him to a wider ex- 
tent than is here indicated, as is shown by a good story told 
by his moderator, Rev. Jeremiah Vardeman. As this gentle- 
man was on his way to the debate, traveling in a gig, he over- 
took, about eleven miles from Washington, a man on foot, and 
hailing him, inquired whither he was going. He said he was 
on his way to Washington. *'Why," said Vardeman, "you 
must have very urgent business to walk so far on such roads 



42 Debates That Made History 

as these/* for, as it had been raining recently, the roads were 
very muddy. The man replied that he had no call of business, 
but that he was going to hear the debate that was to come off 
on the 15th. Surprised at this Vardeman took him at once to 
be a very zealous Baptist, and affecting to be on the other 
side, said, *'Is not our man likely to whip your man Camp- 
bell?'' The man gave him a searching look, and asked, ^^Can 
you tell me if this is the same Mr. Campbell who debated 
with Mr. Walker at Mt. Pleasant, Ohio?" Elder Vardeman 
said he believed he was. The stranger then said: ^'I am not 
a member of any church, I am going to the debate on the sup- 
position that this is the Mr. Campbell who debated at Mt. 
Pleasant three years ago. I heard that debate, and all I have 
to say is, that all creation cannot whip that Mr. Campbell." 

Elder Vardeman, who was noted for his power in defending 
the practice of immersion, was not a little gratified with this 
unexpected and very decided testimony to Mr. Campbell's 
abihty, and came on to the debate, full of cheerful expectation 
as to the fortunes of his favorite tenet. 

And now, dear reader, take careful note of the amazing 
contrast between the acrid and rancerous sectarianism and 
bad manners of Mr. Campbell's opponent, and his own sweet- 
ness and light, high motives and kindly spirit, as made mani- 
fest in these opening remarks of the debate : 

Through the goodness and mercy of God I appear before you, 
at this time and in this place, for the purpose of contending for a 
part of that faith, and an item of that religious practice, once de- 
livered to the saints. My prayer to God is, that for the sake 
of his son Jesus Christ I may speak as I ought to speak ; that in 
the spirit of the truth I may contend for the truth; that with hu- 
mility and love, with zeal according to knowledge and unfeigned 
devotion, I may open my lips on every occasion when I address 
my fellow mortal and immortal creatures on the subject of religion. 
Expecting that they and I will soon appear before the judgment seat 
of Christ, may I speak in such a way that I may be neither ashamed 
nor afraid to meet them there. May I ever act under the influence 
of that wisdom which cometh from above, which is first pure, then 
peaceable, gentle, easy to be entreated, full of mercy and of good 



The War Against Sectarianism 43 

fruits, without partiality and without hypocrisy. And may you, my 
friends, examine, and prove all things, and hold fast that which is 
good. 

Further he said: 

Our design, my paedobaptist friends, is not to widen the breach, 
or to throw stumbling blocks in the way, by inflaming your pas- 
sions; but to lead you to understand this most important institution 
of the Lord of glory, that whosoever of you feareth God may unite 
with me in keeping his commandments as delivered unto us by 
his holy Apostles. 



CHAPTER IV 

McCALLA DEBATE CONCLUDED 

New Features and Striking Peculiarities of This Debate, 
Its Historic Influence, Beginning of the Reformation in 
Kentucky, 



Men, Brethren and Fathers: 

Through the goodness and mercy of God, I appear 
before you, at this time and in this place, for the pur- 
pose of contending for a part of that faith and an 
item of that religious practice, once delivered to the 
saints. My prayer to God is, that for the sake of his 
Son Jesus Christ I may speak as I ought to speak; that 
in the spirit of the truth I may contend for the truth ; 
that with humility and love, with zeal according to 
knowledge and unfeigned devotion, I may open my lips 
on every occasion when I address my fellow mortal and 
immortal creatures on the subject of religion. Expect- 
ing that they and I will soon appear before the judg- 
ment-seat of Christ, may I speak in such a way that I 
may not be ashamed nor afraid to meet them there. 
May I ever act under the influence of that "wisdom 
which Cometh from above, which is first pure, then 
peaceable, gentle, easy to be entreated, full of mercy 
and of good fruits without partiality and without hy- 
pocrisy." And may you, my friends, examine and 
"prove all things, and hold fast that which is good." 
— ^CampheU's opening ivords in his debate ivith Mc- 
Calla, 



L 



CHAPTER IV 
McCALLA DEBATE CONCLUDED 

THESE initial debates between Alexander Campbell and 
his two seceder opponents had most to do with the 
subject of infant baptism, or infant affusion, more correctly 
speaking: the origin of the practice, its historic evolutions in 
ecclesiastical tradition, its relation to church membership, the 
spiritual character of the church. Christian union, and the sec- 
ularization of Christianity. As a proposition for debate it 
held the center of the stage in the controversy between Bap- 
tists and paedobaptists at that stage of American denomina- 
tional history. Although at this time, Mr. Campbell was a 
Presbyterian with reservations — he was in the debate with 
Mr. McCalla, the recognized champion of that denomination, 
in opposition to infant affusion, and sprinkling as a substitute 
for immersion. Mr. McCalla, as a matter of course, made the 
same arguments for the rantizing of babes by the church that 
Mr. Walker had made at Mt. Pleasant, only with more elabo- 
ration and a greater show of scholarship and skill in the use of 
controversial weapons. Like his predecessor the Rev. John 
Walker and his successor, Robert Owen, the atheistic socialist, 
Mr. Campbell's next opponent, he had committed nearly all of 
his material to writing, spent most of his time with his face 
glued to a manuscript, taking little notice of the annihilation of 
his argumentative structure so laboriously built up on paper. 
This left his opponent free to demolish him with a few mas- 
ter strokes, leaving himself ample leisure to invade the wide 
fields of theological reconstruction and reformation, based on 
a rational, spiritual, and common sense interpretation of the 
Bible. 

Mr. Campbell's chief advantage in debate, was not only 
mental ability and dialectic skill, and adequate scholarship on 

47 



48 Debates That Made History 

the subjects discussed, but his accurate and comprehensive 
knowledge of the Bible, and the superior methods he used in 
the interpretation of the Book. His clerical opponents had 
been trained in the study of theology, systematic divinity, ec- 
clesiastical history, church organization, and administration, 
and the scrap doctor construction of sermons, but their igno- 
rance of the Bible was only equalled, if not exceeded by their 
lack of understanding in its interpretation. 

Take a single instance under the first head, Mr. Campbell's 
familiarity with the book, and his textual accuracy, over 
against the opposite in his opponent who had characterized 
himself as "the minister of a divine Savior.'* Mr. McCalla 
in stating his method of proof declared his intention of finding 
a positive divine command in Holy Scripture for infant bap- 
tism. The first thing he did in the execution of this promise 
was an effort to prove that a divine command for a positive 
institution, such as he alleged infant baptism to be, was not 
necessary. He said : 

For instance, there is no express declaration of the unity of God 
to be found in the Old Testament — no express proof in so many 
words — yet we know this proof to be a part of divine revelation as 
certainly as though it were expressly declared in so many words. 

Mr. Campbell, who knew his Bible replied : 

He would place the unity of God and infant baptism upon the 
same obscure footing! No express revelation of either! Did he 
ever read "Hear Oh, Israel, the Lord our God is one Lord?" 

That monumental passage affirming the unity of God, is one 
of the most important in the Old Testament, and yet a learned 
divine of the 19th century, did not know of its existence! 

Another specimen not specifically of Scripture knowledge, 
but in a more general way of Scripture interpretation. When 
Mr. McCalla declared his purpose and his ability to produce 
a divine command for infant baptism, Mr. Campbell, natu- 
rally on the alert, having read his Bible many times without 
finding such command, or anything bearing the remotest re- 
semblance to it, could not help but wonder if the trick up his 



New Features and Striking Peculiarities 49 

opponent's sleeve was something in the nature of the sleight of 
hand process that can draw full grown rabbits out of wads of 
tissue paper. Well, the attempt was made to fulfill the prom- 
ise, and what do you think it was? It was neither fish, flesh, 
nor good red herring, nor living rabbits out of rolls of paper: 
it was the old baptism in the room of circumcision scheme and 
bog}'', a long drawn inference, based on a groundless assump- 
tion, already torn to slivers and beaten to a pulp ! In fact this 
baptism in the room of circumcision dogma met its Waterloo 
here at Washington, Ky. It got such a dramatic and tragic 
punch on the solar plexus that it was not only knocked out, 
and counted out, but it stayed out. No subsequent opponent 
of Alexander Campbell, and no educated paedobaptist dispu- 
tant, ever attempted to resurrect it. Presbyterian ministers 
joined in the proclamation of its demise, and in giving it 
burial without benefit of clergy. 

The chief trouble with these educated ministers of a divine 
Savior, was that they ignored the dispensations of religion; 
they were blind to the distinctly separated stages of evolution 
in the progress of revelation, and tried to interpret the Bible 
by jumbling it altogether without intelligent standards of eval- 
uation, as to its different parts, or distinction between the ages 
of religious development. They talked of Christians and of 
Christian churches as existing two or three thousand years be- 
fore the birth of Christ, or the beginning of the Christian era 
and the Christian church; and they answered the question 
what must I do to be saved, propounded in the Acts of Apos- 
tles by going back to Leviticus and Numbers and the song of 
songs! As I have said before, and shall probably say again, 
the chief purpose of our reformer in holding these debates was 
not to defend immersion nor to overthrow infant baptism, but 
to teach the clergy sane and rational methods of interpreting 
and teaching the Holy Scriptures, so that they might be able 
to **rightly divide the word of truth" in their ministrations to 
the people. 

This kind of instruction in dispensational distinctions, and 



50 Debates That Made History 

in common sense methods of biblical interpretation, is almost 
as much needed now as it was a hundred years ago. It was 
the distinguishing glory of the two Campbells that they in- 
vested the Bible with a new interest, made it a living book, 
and not a dead fetish, not a mere repertoire of isolated texts 
for scrap doctors to dilate upon in their Sunday sermons. 
Alexander Campbell, in particular, was the first of the great 
Bible students in the 19th century to sanctify by actual em- 
ployment, the historical and literary canons and rules of criti- 
cism and laws of language, in the investigation of the prob- 
lems of Holy Scripture, which have been in vogue ever since, 
except among reactionary denominationalists, including some 
of the Disciples. 

In the debate on the mode or action of baptism, Mr. Camp- 
bell had an easy task to show from Greek dictionaries, the 
classic Greek literature of a thousand years. New Testament 
Greek and its translation into English, ecclesiastical history, 
and the usage of the primitive church, the history of the Greek 
church, custodian of the Greek language, which has prac- 
ticed immersion from the Apostolic age to the present hour — 
it was not difficult to show from considerations like these, 
that the Greek word for baptism meant primarily and ordi- 
narily — in fact universally — to dip, to plunge, to immerse. It 
was pointed out that if Christ had intended to institute sprin- 
kling and pouring, for baptism he would have used the specific 
and unmistakable Greek words that meant to sprinkle and 
pour, and not the specific and definite term that signified to 
immerse. The answers to these points were quibbles about 
secondary meanings, and exceptional cases, which for the 
most part did not exist, and for the rest had not the remotest 
reference to baptism in its New Testament acceptation. 

Towards the close of the debate on this proposition a very 
amusing and diverting incident occurred. Mr. McCalla had 
much to say on the dangers and indelicacies of immersion, in- 
sisting that it was pernicious not only to the subject, but to 
the administrator. 



♦ 



New Features and Striking Peculiarities 51 

The administrators, he said, were exposed to sickness, and it must 
unavoidably be injurious to them to be plunging into cold water at 
all seasons, and continuing in it so long, as they often did, and mirac- 
ulous escapes were not to be expected. 

To this Mr. Campbell replied : 

Benjamin Franklin, when minister in Paris, dined with a number 
of French and American gentlemen. A learned French abbe, at 
dinner, entertained the company, with a learned disquisition on the 
deteriorating influence of the American climate on the bodies of 
all animals, alleging that the human body diminished in size and 
in energy, and that even the mind itself shared in the general de- 
terioration. Dr. Franklin made no reply, but after dinner, having 
told the company with what pleasure he had heard the learned 
disquisitions of the philosopher, he moved that the company be di- 
vided, observing that the fairest way of testing the correctness of 
the abbe's theory was to place all the Americans on one side of the 
room, and the French on the other. The motion was carried, and 
behold a company of little, swarthy, insignificant Frenchmen on one 
side, and a row of little giants on the other! "Ay" says the Dr. 
"See, here is a striking proof of the correctness of your theory! 
Now let us take the philosopher's way of testing the correctness of 
the theory of my opponent. There sits on the bench a Baptist 
and a paedobaptist teacher, both well advanced in years; the 
former has, we are told, immersed more persons than any other 
person of the same age in the United States; the other, from his 
venerable age, may be supposed to have sprinkled a great many 
infants. Now, see the pernicious tendency of immersion on the 
Baptist, and the happy influence of sprinkling on the paedobaptist!" 

Dr. Richardson rounds up the story by adding: **As Mr. 
Birch, the Presbyterian Moderator was a small and somewhat 
sickly looking person, and Bishop- Vardeman was of magnifi- 
cent proportions, being upwards of six feet in stature, weigh- 
ing three hundred pounds and of a remarkably florid aspect, 
possessing uncommon and undiminished energy and vigor, 
though 50 years of age, the striking contrast thus presented, 
and the ironical illustration it furnished greatly amused the 
audience at the expense of Mr. McCalla and his argument.^* 
The Seceder^s come back at this brilliant sally was feebleness 
and bad taste personified. He went back to his old game of 
attempting to excite prejudice against Mr. Campbell, by 



52 Debates That Made History 

charging him with being an enemy to all morality, to the ob- 
servance of the Sabbath, and to the good cause of sending the 
gospel to the heathen. He then concluded with the profound 
declaration: ^^that he would never discuss this question again 
until an opponent would come from the regions discovered by 
Captain Simmes, and until a moderator would come from 
Holland weighing five hundred pounds/' 

The outstanding peculiarity of this discussion on Mr. Camp- 
bell's side was the new developments in the doctrine of bap- 
tism for the remission of sins. The only original and peculiar 
distinction of Mr. Campbell's reformatory aspirations, thus 
far developed in a doctrinal way, was the idea of the immer- 
sion of a penitent believer, upon a confession of his faith, into 
the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, in order to the 
remission of his past sins. This conception broached in the de- 
bate with Mr. Walker, drawn out sufficiently to be used, with 
great eifect in an argument against infant baptism, had not, at 
this time, attained the dignity of a separate proposition for 
discussion, as it did in future debates. The idea had been 
growing in his mind and in the minds of his associates, fur- 
ther examination of the New Testament, had strengthened the 
convictions expressed at Mt. Pleasant and used so effectively 
against the tradition of infant affusion. 

In the three years' interval, the matter had assumed an at- 
titude of fundamental importance, in the restoration of 
Apostolic Christianity, as a basis of unity, in the preaching 
of the inspired evangel, and in the administration of the cen- 
tral ordinance of the Christian faith. The opportunity offered 
by the debate at Washington to elucidate and further elabo- 
rate the New Testament idea of baptism and the remission of 
sins, was not to be lost. 

After referring to the Scriptures, which indisputably de- 
clare this connection, he proceeded to explain the sense and 
meaning of this relationship. 



New Features and Striking Peculiarities 53 

The blood of Christ, then, really cleanses us who believe from all 
sin. Behold the goodness of God in giving us a formal token of it, 
by ordaining a baptism expressly "for the remission of sins." The 
water of baptism, then, formally washes away our sins. The blood 
of Christ really washes away our sins. Paul's sins were really par- 
doned when he believed, yet he had no solemn pledge of the fact, 
no formal acquittal, no formal purgation of his sins until he washed 
them away in the water of baptism. To every believer, therefore, 
baptism is a formal and personal remission or purgation of sins. 

It goes without saying that we must pause long enough at 
this point to relate the familiar story of Raccoon John Smith, 
accosted in the streets of Georgetown by a zealous Baptist, 
who flourished a copy of the debate in his face, and shouted : 

What are you going to do about it, Mr. Smith? Here it is in 
black and white ; your man Campbell has declared in this debate 
with Mr. McCalla that Paul's sins were really pardoned when he 
believed and formally pardoned when he was baptized; what have 
you to say to that Mr. Smith? 

Raccoon John replied : 

I have this to say: Mr. Campbell said that when he was a Baptist 
and had no more sense than the rest of you Baptists. 

That was smart retort and brilliant repartee whatever one 
may think of its theological implications. 

There is at least one thing of historical significance along 
the line of doctrinal evolution in those days, and that is, if Mr. 
Campbell had stuck to that interpretation of the meaning and 
purpose of baptism, the rupture between him and the Bap- 
tists would have been indefinitely postponed. It is true they 
turned him out of the church because he said in his famous 
sermon on the law, that Judaism was not Christianity, that 
Christians were not under the law of Moses, and that John 
the Baptist did not establish the church in the wilderness, nor 
anywhere else. But these minor issues could have been rec- 
onciled and adjusted to union if the interpretation of baptism, 
given out in the debate with McCalla, could have held the 
field in reformation pulpits. Mr. Campbell's biographer makes 
this comment on the passage just cited: 



54 Debates That Made History 

Thus the design of baptism and its true place in the economy of 
the gospel, had gradually become clearer, and its importance pro- 
portionally enhanced in his estimation, since the debate with Walker. 
Often, during the intervening period, had this particular point been 
the subject of conversation between him and his father, as well 
as with Walter Scott, and of careful Scripture examinations, and 
these utterances in the McCalla debate presented the views they 
had beforehand agreed upon as the true and obvious teachings of 
the New Testament. 

The evolutionary process and resultant changes, did not 
stop here, at least, with the men associated with Mr. Camp- 
bell, and many that came later into the movement. The ex- 
igencies of controversy, which always tend to extreme meas- 
ures and short cuts, hardened these broader and deeper concep- 
tions of the reformer on the design of baptism into ideas con- 
cerning the ordinance that abolished all distinctions between 
real and formal, vital and incidental, internal and external; 
changing the most spiritual and symbolical of religious rites 
into a juridic institution based on legal enactment, to be en- 
forced and practiced in terms of courthouses and political 
constitutions, after the manner of the priests' code in Exodus 
and Leviticus. This was no help, but a great hindrance to 
the ideals of unity cherished by the movement. 

Mr. Campbell himself, at heart, never shared these legalis- 
tic views, although at times he seemed to sanction them. His 
matured and final conceptions on the subject are formulated 
and fully canvassed in the debate with Rice twenty years 
later. These will be weighed and considered and their rela- 
tion to the success of the movement indicated, when that 
point is reached in the course of these historical studies. 

This discussion with McCalla, in 1823, in its most impor- 
tant record was the beginning of the current reformation in 
Kentucky. The forces liberated, and the influences set in 
motion in that discussion, were electrical, illuminating, and 
far reaching in the consequences that followed. The effects 
were more pronounced and effective than they had been at Mt. 
Pleasant three years before. 



New Features and Striking Peculiarities 55 

The personality of the reformer, his extraordinary dialectic 
power, the freshness of his thoughts, the originality of his con- 
ceptions, the simplicity and clearness of his manner of inter- 
preting and teaching the Holy Scriptures, made a great im- 
pression on the susceptibilities of the orator-loving, brain-ad- 
miring and genius-worshiping Kentuckian of the blue grass 
regions. At the close he paid a running visit to Lexington, the 
blue grass capital, in company with Elder Vardeman, preached 
a single sermon, in the Baptist church, of which the most 
eloquent and eminent divine in Kentucky, Dr. Fishback, was 
pastor, and what a sermon it must have been ! It was on the 
Divinity of Christ, based on the first chapter of Hebrews, and 
it never ceased to be talked about till the last man died who 
heard it. Dr. Theo. S. Bell, an eminent physician of Louis- 
ville, thus speaks of it : 

I never had heard anything that approached the power of that 
discourse, nor have I ever heard it equalled since. Under the 
training of my mother, one of the most thorough scholars in the 
Bible that I ever knew, and of Dr. Fishback, although I then made 
no pretensions to Christianity, I was almost as familiar with the 
Bible as with my alphabet. But that speech on Hebrews lifted me 
into a world of thought of which I had previously known nothing. 
It has been forty-five years since I heard that pulpit discourse, but 
it is as vivid in my memory, I think, as when I first heard it. 

After that prophetic, historic deliverance, Lexington, then 
both the Athens and the Jerusalem of the South and West, 
capitulated to Alexander Campbell, and ever afterwards re- 
garded him as the mightiest intellect that had ever visited the 
city. And the intellectual contest was not all. The religious 
movement under his leadership, pleading for the restoration of 
the unity and catholicity of the apostolic church, obtained a 
footing at once, and soon became the greatest spiritual force 
in the city's life, and all the region round about, and remains 
so, and more so, to this day. A few years later, a gentleman, 
standing on the steps of a church in Paris, a flourishing town 
about half way between Lexington and Washington, declared, 
as he waved his right hand through the air: 



56 Debates That Made History 

Campbellism, Bourbon whiskey, and dogfennel have taken the 
blue grass of Kentucky, and the first named of this trinity will soon 
have captured the whole state. 

To which may be added by a witness who deposeth nearly 
a hundred years later, Bourbon whiskey has gone to where the 
woodbine twineth, and let us hope to that bourne whence no 
traveler returns; dogfennel has diminished to a negligible 
quantity, but what the gentleman called Campbellism, is the 
regnant spiritual force of central Kentucky, has the mountain 
regions to the east fairly well in hand, with a much stronger 
and more vigorous and growing representation in the bear 
grass and pennyroyal regions to the south and southwest, and 
on to the boundary lines of Ohio and Tennessee. All of this 
and much more came out of the debate between Alexander 
Campbell and Wm. McCalla in the little town of Washington, 
Mason County, Kentucky in the fall of 1823. A history mak- 
ing episode, wasn't it? 



CHAPTER V 

THIRD DEBATE: CONFLICT BETWEEN CHRIS- 
TIANITY AND LNFIDELITY 

The Debate with Mr. Robert Owen, of New Lanark, Scot- 
land, in Cincinnati, Ohio, April 13 to 21, 1829. Impressions 
of an Eye and Ear Witness. 



By my intercourse with Mr. Campbell I concluded 
he was conscientiously desirous of ascertaining truth 
from error on these momentous subjects, that he 
was much experienced in public discussions, and well 
educated for the ministry. His superior talents were 
generally admitted. Under these circumstances, I did 
not feel myself at liberty to decline the call he had 
publicly made upon me. — Robert Oiven. 

What is man? Whence came he? Whither does he 
go? Is he a mortal or an immortal being? Is he 
doomed to spring up like the grass, bloom like a flower, 
drop his seed into the earth, and die forever? Is 
there no object of future hope? No God — no heaven 
— no exalted society to be known or enjoyed? * * * 
These are the awful and sublime merits of the ques- 
tion at issue. It is not what we shall eat, nor what we 
shall drink, unless we shall be proved to be mere an- 
imals; but it is, shall we live or die forever? It is 
as beautifully expressed by a Christian poet — 

"Shall spring ever visit the mouldering urn? 
Shall day ever dawn on the night of the grave?" 

— Alexander Campbell, 



i 



CHAPTER V 

THIRD DEBATE: CONFLICT BETWEEN CHRISTIANITY 
AND INFIDELITY 

I AM indebted to A. McLean of the Foreign Christian 
Missionary Society for a typewritten copy of an article 
from an old magazine, which he dug up from the historical 
and literary archives of Cincinnati, in which the editor, who 
attended the Campbell and Owen debate, gave his impressions 
of the men and their respective causes. This document has 
historical value as a record of the disinterested opinions and 
observations of an intelligent outsider. It has also a secondary 
if somewhat diverting importance as a rhetorical composition, 
characteristic of the time. As a specimen of stilted, high flown, 
Johnsonian, Bishop Bascom rhetoric, it takes the cake, passes 
it around' and goes the length of referring to a debate as a 
*logomachic tilt'* and a "grand tournament." 

Those were the good old times down south when big-word 
orators and rhetorical scribes spoke of a thimble as an **argen- 
tiferous truncated cone, convex on the summit and semi-per- 
forated with symmetrical indentations." But notwithstand- 
ing these spots on the sun, from the point of view of our mod- 
ern simplicity, I make no apology for using this report and 
criticism of the great debate somewhat freely. It is both in- 
teresting and edifying and wholy pertinent to the end I have 
in view. 

With a few strokes of his wordy pen he touches up the cir- 
cumstances of its origin. He writes : 

The glove was first thrown down by Mr. Owen, in New Orleans. 
None of the ministers there saw fit to take it up although the Presby- 
terian Synod was in session at the time. But it was circulated ex- 
tensively in the papers that the ministers were challenged, the world 

59 



60 Debates That Made History 

over, to a logomachic tilt with Mr. Owen, on the evidences of 
Christianity. Mr. Campbell, who had gained extensive reputation 
by dealing hard and dexterous blows as a polemic theological dis- 
putant at Washington, Mason County, Ky., in a set disputation with 
Rev. Mr. McCalla on some points between Presbyterians and Bap- 
tists, took up the glove and publicly advertised, that his courage was 
up to the point of doing battle, in this grand tournament, in the face 
of all Christians and, more especially before all the gentlemen and 
ladies who might assemble, at any given place, which should be 
central and convenient for the said disputation. Mr. Owen on his 
way from New Harmony, Ind., to Europe included Bethany in his 
route and called on the Rev. Mr. Campbell and ascertained, satis- 
factorily, not only the extent of his calibre, but the keenness of his 
metal, his disposition for fairness of fight, and the honest zeal for 
the truth, which he was compelled to believe, filled the bosom of 
this gentleman. Having measured with his eye the proud dimensions, 
the brawny intellectual muscle and sinew of this offering opponent; 
having ascertained to his satisfaction that there was a happy mixture 
of Scotch shrewdness with Kentucky hard fight in the premises, he 
deemed it not unworthy a logomachic fame, won extensively in both 
hemispheres, to engage with Mr. Campbell to do wordy battle in 
the city of Cincinnati, in the month of April and the year, commonly 
called that of our Lord, 1829. 

We next have a descriptive word on the interval between 
this interview and the beginning of the discussion : 

Mr. Owen having settled the preliminaries of the fight, went his 
way meditating upon the eventful disputation, over the resounding 
sea, to New Lanark in Scotland ; talked, we dare say, about the 
social system; and, no doubt, felt the germ of an intellectual egg 
silently breeding within him, from which, in due time, should hatch 
the embryo of rout, ruin and dismay, to ministers, titles and match- 
makers. The other betook himself, like a high mettled and good 
soldier of the church militant, to all the black letter, long bearded 
sages from Sanchoniathon and Herodotus down to Dr. Fishback of 
Lexington. Meantime, the papers from Dan to Beersheba, from 
Land's End to the Shetland Islands, from Calais to the Archangel, 
from Roddy to the Sabine, rung with the note of preparation for 
this grand tournament, with which our city was to be honored. 

The attitude of the press is next touched upon; the indif- 
ference of the secular papers, that stupidly failed to realize 
what a source of good copy they were allowing to pass unim- 
proved, and the hostility of the denominational religious 



Conflict Between Christianity and Infidelity 61 

press, which knew only too well, that it had no use for copy, 
whatever might happen to be its character with which Alex- 
ander Campbell had anything to do in producing. He was the 
David who had cracked the skull of sectarian denominational- 
ism in at least two fatal instances, and what could another 
victory mean, even against the common enemy, except in- 
creased publicity and popularity for the heretic and his here- 
sies? This was the true inwardness of the attitude of the de- 
nominational press of the city, which our candid witness did 
not seem to know. He writes : 

Most of the papers gave It a passing article without note or com- 
ment; and so we received it In different papers, that came to us 
over the sea. Not so the enlightened, amiable, mild, most logical 
erudite Pandect of our city. It growled thereupon. In a tone evincing 
that the writer had a load of most righteous bile on his bosom; re- 
garding the approaching tournament with any feelings, rather than 
those of delectation and quiet confidence In the omnipotence of truth. 
It rather seemed to the said Pandect as though war, pestilence and 
famine were all concentrated In this most puissant mischief. But 
though this tasteful, evangelical and singularly logical vehicle was 
moved to the Interior against the said disputation, as a most pestilent 
mischief, the Ohio still flowed downwards. The disputants, heeding 
not this manifest displeasure, ate and drank as In duty bound, as 
Athletae, on a system of diet and regimen, In training for this event- 
ful collision of Intellect. 

His account of the arrival of the Athletae in Cincinnati is 
decidedly moving. 

In due time we learned that the champion of the covenant had 
been wafted down our stream from the rising sun In burnished 
panoply, and fraught with abundant syllogistic appointments from 
the ample magazines of Bethany. The European philosopher had 
gained saltiness on the Atlantic brine; had heard natural thunder in 
the tropical Isles of Jamaica and Cuba, had defied the black vomit 
of Vera Cruz ; and had been perched in the empyrean and medita- 
tive heights of the city of Montezuma, treasuring materials of power 
as he thus traversed both hemispheres, he came upwards on us from 
the west. Thus these conflicting minds came in contact In our city, 
like two conflicting thunder clouds. 



62 Debates That Made History 

Equally impelling is the writer's description of the two 
Athletae, who engage in this ''Grand tournament" and "Logo- 
machic Tilt." Said he: 

Then, we gazed at the two Athletae and imagined the munitions 
of logomachy laid away in mysterious and awful order and power 
in the narrow precincts of "two small heads." We silently admired 
the infinite compressibility of that knowledge, which is power, more 
energetic than thundered from all the cannon of Borodino. 

He writes again : 

Every one has seen the face or the print of the benevolent "social" 
cosmopolite, the Welsh philosopher, whose strange taste it is, to wan- 
der over the world, bestowing vast sums in charity, and to obtain re- 
turn an ample harvest of vilification and abuse. He was dressed in 
Quaker plainness wearing his customary undaunted, self-possessed, 
good natured face surmounted, as most people know, with an in- 
tellectual rudder of almost portentous amplitude, that might well 
have been deemed an acquisition in a pilgrimage to the promontory 
of noses. From each side of his prominent index of mental power 
beamed such an incessant efflux of cheerfulness, as might well shame, 
in comparison, the sour and tristful visage of many an heir of the 
hope of immortality. 

Referring, of course to Mr. Campbell: 

The chivalrous champion of the covenant is a citizen of Bethany, 
near Wheeling in Virginia; a gentleman we should think between 
thirty and forty; (He was 41) with a long face, a rather small head, 
of a sparkling bright and cheerful countenance, and finely arched 
forehead; in the earnest vigor of youth, and with the very first 
sprinkling of white on his crown. He wore an aspect as of one 
who had words both ready and inexhaustible and as possessed of 
the excellent grace of perseverance, to a degree that he would not 
retract an inch in the way of concession, to escape the crack and 
pudder of a dissolving world. His venerable gray headed father, 
also a clergyman, and two younger brothers, were with him. It was 
understood that he was independent in point of property, and that 
he edits a religious paper of extensive circulation. It ought not to 
be forgotten that both the father and son perform their clerical 
duties to the congregation at Bethany, gratis. 

Perhaps the most penetrating remark in this flood refers to 
a characteristic feature of the Campbell and Owen debate 
that every reader of the published work cannot help but 
notice : 



Conflict Between Christianity and Infidelity 63 

The historian relateth with grief that during the eight long 
days of this logical tournament, these two coursers were riding up 
and down the field of controversy, constantly menacing fight, but 
never coming to close quarters in the actual tug of battle; for lo: 
instead of an effectual ^'closing in" quiddities and metaphysical cuts 
and thrusts, which we expected would ''make the lint fly," at once, 
Mr. Owen "fought shy," reserved his fire and intrenched himself 
impregnably behind the "twelve divine, fundamental laws of human 
nature" precisely as our soldiers did on the glorious 8th, behind the 
cotton bales below New Orleans. On the contrary, our Western 
friend of the covenant showed manful fight on the open field, to the 
end of the joust. 

The editor of the Western Monthly Review further testi- 
fies by giving his readers a very suggestive analysis of Mr. 
Owen's effort at argument and illustration. It has the merit 
of showing that such attempts at argument were instinctively 
answered by the people, who heard, before Mr. Campbell 
could get to them. They laughed his twelve laws out of 
countenance, horror stricken at his gospel of dirt and death. 

*^The twelve fundamental laws," or twelve pillars of the 
social system, are predicated on the following asserted doc- 
trines. We are the '^effects*' of our ^'circumstances,** as 
strictly as inanimate matter obeys its laws. Therefore, we 
are not subjects of responsibility, praise or blame. We can 
neither think, act, love, hate, marry, become fathers, eat, 
drink, sleep, or die, other than as we do. These irresistible 
circumstances having placed us in a predicament, every way 
nauseous and irrational, it follows that we ought, forthwith, 
to assert our control over these uncontrollable circumstances, 
and change them for the infinitely better class, which the phil- 
osopher proposeth in their stead. He came over these laws 
with a frequency of development and repetition, which elic- 
ited a frequent laugh at his expense from all who perceived 
not that his sole purpose, in this tournament, was to make the 
reputation of his antagonist a kite, to take up his social sys- 
tem into the full view of the community, and by constant 
repetition to imprint a few of his leading axioms on the 



64 Debates That Made History 

memory of the multitude, that could, in no other way, have 
been collected to hear. 

The positions, which he thus fixed on the memory of his 
hearers, with an untiring perseverance, were, that a Christian 
infant educated in Hindoostan would be a Gentoo, in Turkey 
a Mohammedan, in a cannibal tribe a cannibal, in a Quaker 
family a Quaker; and so of the rest. He would have nothing 
to do with speculation, and would take nothing but facts. 
There were no facts, on w^hich to affirm, or deny, touching 
the being of a God, the origin of a material universe, nor man. 
We knew a few facts, and might form probable conjectures 
about others. He believed some historical statements, when 
they ran not counter to the twelve laws; but held all history 
of a contrary character wonderfully cheap. It may be, there- 
fore, imagined how he disposed of the external and internal 
evidences, the miracles and prophecies of our religion. His 
twelve laws constituted a grand besom, with which all reli- 
gions, of all ages and climes, were alike to be brushed away, 
*'like chaff before the wind.'* 

He described the biped breed, under present circumstances, 
as being miserable stock. He said that he had never seen "a 
rational face" in his life. The origin of the present genera- 
tion seemed to him an ill-managed, half-dozing ^^circum- 
stance*' of the legal prostitution, called marriage. That mat- 
ter was now better understood, as it related to the great im- 
provement of the breed of quadrupeds, which, he hinted, 
might be carried to an infinitely higher and more worthy scale 
of melioration when applied to the breed of bipeds. The 
energy of mutual liking, and of constantly accumulating 
power of mind, will and muscle, promised illimitable advan- 
tages to the generations of the future. As it was now, it was 
a joke and rank perjury to swear, either in prose or rhyme, 
on the knees or howsoever ^'stirring the stumps in doleful 
dumps," that the parties would love each other //// death them 
do part; seeing it was not improbable, from the analogy of no 



Conflict Between Christianity and Infidelity 65 

small number of similar cases, that they would prove very 
tabby cats soon after the lapse of the honeymoon. 

Christian society was one web of lie, warp and woof, dis- 
simulation, quarrel, and bloodshed. All the great drama of 
deceptive acting, all the malevolence, poverty and evils of 
society he traced to the Free Will systems of religion, to the 
priests and the weekly preachings of ministers, to whom none 
might reply. Some of his illustrations had simplicity, 
piquancy and point. Take an example. He said : 

My friends, it Is not quite two months, since I was in the great 
square in the city of Mexico. I heard a little bell tinkle. A friend 
said to me. Kneel down, Mr. Owen, or you may else be killed. The 
Host is passing. I took out my pocket handkerchief, laid it on the 
ground, and kneeled on it Had you been reared in Mexico, my 
friends, you would have been as serious in that way, as you are 
now in your own. And, so far as numbers can give authority to 
opinion, they are greatly your superiors. 

According to his reasoning : 

The social system is to be a complete renovator and purifier, 
a nova -progenies, a. new race of most vigorous and beautiful lads 
and lassies is to be turned into the fresh clover field of existence. 
Undisturbed with meditations upon the past or the future; un- 
shackled with matrimony, almost freed from disease and the seeds 
of decay, performing the little labor necessary to subsistence, chiefly 
by machinery, with the greatest abundance of the best of every- 
thing for human nature (a favorite phrase), these pretty ones will 
have little to do, but to eat, and drink, and rise up to play; billing 
like turtle doves, so long as mutual liking lasts; and dissolving the 
partnership with the first harbingers of a murky atmosphere. They 
will treasure chemistry, philosophy and useful knowledge, and pry 
into some of nature's privacies in a new sort of style. Children of 
five years will know more than the best educated scholars of twenty 
do in the present order of things. The world is to be dotted off 
into one immense family of communities, of a minimum of three 
hundred and a maximum of two thousand, all wantoning in the 
aforesaid rich clover field. Travelling is to be freed from its pres- 
ent bitter concomitant, expense ; for the traveller will be everywhere 
at home, and welcome to the commonwealth of the community. So- 
ciety will be inexpressibly delectable; for like will cling to like, 
precisely like two magnets. 



66 Debates That Made History 

Such is Mr. Owen's romance of the social system — as fair 
as a peony, as fragrant as white honeysuckle; as loving, as 
the Vermonter said, as forty — and alas! as short-lived as the 
prophet's gourd. 

**The particles which compose my body,'' said the philos- 
opher, "are eternal. They had no beginning, and can have 
no end. I shall be decomposed, and lose my consciousness in 
death, to be recomposed, and to reappear in new forms of 
life and enjoyment." At least he could not be charged with 
disguise, nor reservation ; but came out with gratuitous plain- 
ness, in the most revolting and desolating tenets of the creed 
of the everlasting sleep of death. As he uttered this, a gen- 
eral revulsion of horror passed across the countenance of the 
crowded audience. We felt at the moment the long covered 
coals of our own eloquence burning in our bosom; and fan- 
cied that we could have made an overwhelming appeal to the 
horror stricken multitude. Not so Mr. Campbell. He had 
other combinations for the close of the campaign, and had 
determined to put his antagonist to the logical sword, in his 
own time and way, secundum artem, Mr. Owen aware of the 
impression he had created, diverted the current of feeling by a 
pun. **My friends," said he, "you have heard these wonder- 
ful stories. If you can away with them all — you are able, 
indeed, to swallow a camel (Campbell)." 



CHAPTER VI 

ROBERT OWEN AND HIS SOCIAL SYSTEM 

Agnosticism before Huxley, and Bolshevism before Lenine 

and Trotsky. 



I propose to prove, as I have already attempted to 
do in my lectures, that all the religions of the v^orld 
have been founded on the ignorance of mankind ; that 
they are directly opposed to the never-changing laws 
of our nature ; that they have been, and are, the real 
source of vice, disunion, and misery of every descrip- 
tion; that they are now the only real bar to the forma- 
tion of a society of virtue, of intelligence, of charity in 
its most extended sense, and of sincerity and kindness 
among the whole human family; and that they can be 
no longer maintained except through the ignorance of 
the mass of the people, and the tyranny of the few over 
that mass. — Robert Oiven, 

Never was there such a moral phenomenon exhib- 
ited upon this earth as the first establishment and prog- 
ress of Christianity. The instruments by which it was 
established, the opposition with which it was met, and 
the success which attended its career, were all of the 
most extraordinary character. The era of Christianity 
itself presents a very sublime spectacle: the whole 
world reposing in security under the protecting wings 
of the most august of all the Caesars; peace, univer- 
sal peace, with her healthful arms encircling all the 
nations composing the great empire which was itself 
the consummation of all the empires of the ancient 
world. Polytheism, with her myriads of temples and 
her myriads of priests, triumphantly seated in the af- 
fections of a superstitious people, and swaying a magic 
scepter from the Tiber to the ends of the earth. Legis- 
lators, magistrates, philosophers, orators, and poets, 
all combined to plead her cause and to protect her from 
insult and injury. Rivers of sacrificial blood crimsoned 
all the rites of pagan worship; and clouds of incense 
arose from every city, town, and hamlet, in honor of 
the gods of Roman superstition. Just in this singular 
and unrivaled crisis, when the Jews' religion, though 
corrupted by tradition and distracted by faction, was 
venerated for its antiquity, and admired for its divin- 
ity; when idolatry was at its zenith in the pagan world, 
the Star of Bethlehem appears. The marvelous scene 
opens in a stable. What fearful odds! What a 
strange contrast! Idolatry on the throne, and the 
founder of a new religion and a new empire lying 
in a manger! — Alexander Campbell. 



CHAPTER VI 

ROBERT OWEN AND HIS SOCIAL SYSTEM 

THE brilliant author oi De Profundis remarked that he 
was glad to find that there were Christians before Christ, 
but sorry to have to admit that there hadn't been any 
since, with the solitary exception of St. Francis of Assissi. 
There have been plenty of agnostics since Huxley coined the 
word and Bolsheviks without number, since Lenine painted 
Russia with the blood of her best citizens; but Huxley was 
not the first agnostic, nor Lenine and Trotsky the first Bol- 
sheviks. We have a composite mental photograph of the 
three in the personality and philosophy of Robert Owen, a 
citizen of the world, who was born in Wales and hailed from 
Scotland; who lived a long time, debated and propagated his 
nostrums, before the apostle of agnosticism, and the prophets 
of the proletarian upheaval in Russia, began their experiments 
that had so ingloriously failed in the hands of their prede- 
cessor, Owen. 

It must be said in this connection, however, and before we 
go any further, in justice to all parties concerned, that the 
Welsh philosopher, — having been well born, with an admir- 
ably balanced and blended temperament, and a good disposi- 
tion, — came into an environment made by the Christian re- 
ligion from hereditary forces started and fostered by Chris- 
tianity, followed by Christian training, all of which, in com- 
bination, made him a Christian gentleman in spirit and behav- 
ior. He was better than his creed, as is so often the case with 
the special pleaders of our common humanity. His motives 
were good. He was altruistic, otheristic, philanthropic in his 
aims and plans. He was a Christian gentleman in everything 
but name and philosophy, a wholesome credit, when compared 

69 



70 Debates That Made History 

to the atrabilious, sectarian saints, with whom Mr. Campbell 
had held his previous debates. 

It may be doubted if any debate on theological and social 
issues in the whole history of human differences, was ever 
characterized by such gentlemanly and friendly conduct be- 
tween the disputants as this one in Cincinnati between Rob- 
ert Owen and Alexander Campbell, skeptic and heretic as 
they were. Mr. Campbell went the length in one of his 
speeches of apologizing for the necessity of referring to Mr. 
Owen as his **opponent.'^ These two gentlemen referred to 
each other, throughout, not as Ho Satanas, "The adversary,'* 
but as "my friend" and "my worthy friend." 

During a visit of the social philosopher to Bethany to ar- 
range the preliminaries of the contemplated discussion, he and 
Mr. Campbell became acquainted and had much friendly con- 
versation on topics of mutual interest. It was during this 
visit that an incident took place which furnished us Disciple 
preachers such a splendid introduction for a sermon on im- 
mortality, or the survival after death. 

In one of their wanderings for exercise or recreation, the 
two great men came to the family burying ground on the hill, 
above the classic Buffalo when Mr. Owen said: "There is 
one advantage I have over the Christian — I am not afraid to 
die. Most Christians have fear in death, but if some few 
items of my business were settled, I should be perfectly will- 
ing to die at any moment." "Well," answered Mr. Campbell, 
"you say you have no fear in death; have you any hope in 
death?" After a solemn pause, "No," said Mr. Owen. 
"Then," rejoined Mr. Campbell, pointing to an ox standing 
near, "you are on a level with that brute; he has fed till he 
is satisfied, and stands in the shade, whisking off the flies, and 
has neither hope nor fear in death." At this, it is said, Mr. 
Owen smiled and evinced some confusion, but was quite un- 
able to deny the justness of Mr. Campbell's inference. 



Robert Owen and His Social System 71 

There is another tradition, not as authentic as the one just 
related, to the effect that Mr. Campbell followed this friendly 
passage with an eloquent appeal to the philosopher to accept 
Christ, to become a Christian according to the Bible, and to 
run his benevolent schemes under the auspices of the Christian 
religion. Mr. Owen shed tears, but did not yield. Like the 
fish St. Francis preached to, when the sharks kept on sharking 
and the eels kept on eeling, very well pleased were they, but 
they kept on the old way; so Mr. Owen, as the story goes, 
was deeply impressed with Mr. Campbell's exhortation, but, 
like the sharks and the eels that were so profoundly moved by 
the eloquence of the priest, he preferred the old way of his 
Bolshevik benevolence and atheism. 

The issue of this debate at Cincinnati was not communism, 
nor socialism in any of its phases. Mr. Campbell had no 
objection to the communistic philosophy or principle and none 
to the organization of society on a co-operative basis. In 
fact, he had spoken in terms of approval and praise of the 
sociological experiments and the benevolent aims and pur- 
poses of the societies his friend was trying to establish 
throughout the world and, at one time, had taken part him- 
self in organizing a similar enterprise, minus atheism and 
free love, and plus God and the Christian religion. 

It was the gross materialism, the naked, unadorned and 
shameless animalism of the social system, the barren east wind 
of atheism, that fired indignation and opposition in the mind 
of Alexander Campbell. He called attention to the fact that 
there was nothing in the boasted "social system** nor city of 
mental independence, worth a fig, that was not an unblushing 
plagiarism from Christian enterprises. 

Mr. Dale, the father-in-law of Robert Owen, gave him his 
first ideas of the co-operative system, with its various arrange- 
ments and departments for the betterment of the working 
classes; and the first Christian church established on earth, 



72 Debates That Made History 

gave him an authoritative example in a social emergency, for 
a communit}'' of goods. His infidelity came from the French 
Revolution and his free-love from the tutelage of Dr. Gra- 
ham, who had made himself conspicuous in that line of advo- 
cacy. Nothing distinctive had been contributed by Mr. 
Owen but his ^'twelve fundamental laws of human nature/' 
the *'gems" of his *'casket," as he fondly called them, and they 
were as applicable to chimpanzees and pigs, as they were to 
human beings. 

Mr. Owen's zeal in seeking a controversy with American 
Christianity was not, as we have already seen, the enthusiasm 
of humanity so much as the opportunism of a propagandist 
bent on capitalizing the standing of the Christian religion and 
the reputation of his opponent to advertise his bantling, the 
social system. This effort to drag the cosmic process of cir- 
cumstances, over which, according to his philosophy, we have 
no control, at the tail of his social comet provoked the risibles 
of his audience, who saw through his little game to advertise 
his new irreligion of humanity, as an eye witness testified in 
the last chapter, by the senseless repetition of his twelve divine 
laws of human nature. 

His opponent, of course, was not slow to point out that this 
effort to organize a pagan philanthropy in a Christian coun- 
try by ignoring sin and cutting out the human nature it was 
trying to cure, was doomed to failure from the start. The 
fool assertion that all religions had been founded in igno- 
rance and superstition, and were the fruitful causes of the 
world's misery, poverty, vice, crime and all the other evils 
that aflBict us, was contradicted by the very first effort to put 
the principles of this Soviet philosophy into practical effect. 
The initial effort at New Lanark had not been projected nor 
operated on the basis of the twelve laws. The majority of 
the people who entered the organization were Presbyterians 
and Independents. There were churches of these denomina- 



Robert Owen and His Social System 73 

tions in the town, well attended by intelligent people, and 
Robert Owen himself contributed to the building fund of one 
of these churches. The ^'jewels" of his ^'casket" did not shine 
to much advantage in this first experiment of the social system. 

When it came to New Harmony, Mr. Owen's most ambi- 
tious effort, pregnant, as he believed, with tremendous hopes 
for world redemption, the mountain had been in labor to 
bring forth not a mouse even — only ''the tw^elve fundamental 
laws of human nature.^' 

Believing the United States to be a more promising field for 
experimentation than priest-ridden, state-church dominated 
Europe, he purchased, in 1824, the property belonging to the 
Rappites, in Indiana, consisting of the village of New Har- 
mony and thirty thousand acres of land, where, as the histo- 
rian observes, he soon collected a community of several thou- 
sand persons, and where under the influence of zeal and talent, 
the co-operative system seemed, for a time, to realize the high- 
est hopes of its advocates. Mr. Owen himself, as the same 
witness testified, constitutionally sanguine, was so confident 
of the success of his principles, as to assert that, in the course 
of three years, the city of Cincinnati would be depopulated 
by the migration of its citizens to New Harmony. A very 
short time, however, was sufficient to dispel this illusion and 
before the period fixed in his prediction had expired, this 
seemed more likely to be fulfilled in regard to New Harmony 
itself through the discords and disappointments which were 
constantly occurring and which drove off many to distant 
cities. 

Those enthusiastic foreigners, including radicals and cranks 
of all ranks and orders, creeds and colors, ringed, streaked and 
striped, like Jacob's cattle, who had streamed across the At- 
lantic to bask in the sunshine of the new paradise of the city 
of mental independence as a matter of course, had contrib- 
uted manfully to the disintegrating processes that were going 
on. They helped and hastened the transformation of the 



74 Debates That Made History 

"system" into a Donnybrook Fair, a veritable witches* caul- 
dron of mental and moral confusion, in which their meetings 
for ^'spiite'* were split into factions, in which parliamentary 
law was disgraced, violent antagonisms developed, heads 
cracked, perhaps; a spectacle illustrating hate and hysteria 
more than concern for the new brotherhood of humanity — 
Bolshevism, in other words, before its time. Sinful, depraved 
and selfish human nature, unchecked by the redeeming and 
regenerating forces of the gospel, all consideration of which 
had been left out of his scheme by its benevolent founder, like 
wandering chickens, had come home to roost, when reds of 
the French Revolution and English secularism insisted on 
their right to function. 

Mr. Campbell spoke of New Harmony, the land of prom- 
ise, to which multitudes flocked with eagerness, having to 
witness the dissolving of the charm, and the social builders 
disbanding under the influence of the aweful realities of na- 
ture, reason, and religion. This result was chiefly due to the 
abolition of the marriage contract, and the appointment of 
nurses to take charge of the infants of the community. This 
furnished Mr. Campbell an opportunity to clench the nails 
he had driven into the coflin of the social system and the city 
of mental independence. He referred to the joys of the 
mother in having the care of her own offspring. *'The smiles 
of her infant,'' said he, ''the opening dawn of reason, the in- 
dications of future greatness or goodness, as they exhibit them- 
selves to her sanguine expectations, open to her sources of en- 
joyment incomparably overpaying the solicitudes and gentle 
toils of nursing.'' He showed that the system, instead of be- 
ing accordant with human nature, was at war with it, "aimed 
a mortal blow at all our ideas of social order and social 
happiness." 

Well, Cincinnati is still on the map, with a great increase 
of population since the debate in 1829, and good prospects for 
the future, but where is New Harmony, the city of mental 



Robert Owen and His Social System 75 

independence? Echo answers, "Where?'* And thereby hangs 
a tale fit to point a moral of the most suggestive significance. 
Infidelity cannot organize. Whether social or individual, it 
has nothing to organize on; nothing vv^ith cohesive vitality to 
hold things together. The shores of history are literally 
strewn with the wreckage of infidel attempts at organization. 
Its local associations or "lyceums," organized to promote the 
interest of "free thought" and "mental independence," go to 
pieces sooner or later, generally sooner, on the rocks of nega- 
tion and the "twelve fundamental laws of human nature," 
but the little Bethels of the land, to say nothing of its great 
religious institutions, with all their limitations, with the ever- 
lasting "Yea" at the heart of their message, sing with Tenny- 
son's brook: 

"For men may come and men may go, 
But I go on for ever." 

There was in this debate the usual play and by-play, thrust 
and counter-thrust, repartee and numerous sallies, and many 
of these jeux d'esprits were singularly quick and felicitous. 
Two of these may be given that turned out in favor of Mr. 
Owen, who could laugh, and stand to be laughed at. 

A certain Paul Brown wrote a book entitled A Twelve 
Months' Residence in New Harmony. He was said to be a 
dissatisfied grumbletonian who did up Mr. Owen and his 
system as with a cleaver. "We have just heard," said Mr. 
Campbell, "Mr. Owen's beautiful theory of the social system 
and Paul Brown's Twelve Months' Residence at New Har- 
mony'' — and he made a rhetorical pause, to give force to the 
intended sarcasm, in saying, "We'll show the thing in prac- 
tice." Mr. Owen, who had hitherto received the thirty min- 
utes' fire without smiling and with unwincing silence, saw 
what was coming after "Paul Brown's twelve months' resi- 
dence" and interjected in the rhetorical pause, "is all a lie." 
"The effect," said an eye witness, "was electric, although 
whole numbers of sentences are required to relate it." 



76 Debates That Made History 

Another retort was still happier. Mr. Campbell had been 
discussing the evidences of Christianity from the fulfillment of 
prophecy. He gave the customary calculation of the duration 
of a prophetic year. Said he: ''Mr. Owen denies the truth 
of prophecy and is, at the same time, a prophet himself. Aye, 
and a false prophet, too, as I shall prove. Few of you can 
have forgotten that, three years since, he prophecied in this 
very city, that within three years the houses would be ten- 
antless and the inhabitants emptied into 'the city of mental 
independence.* " It was a home thrust and seemed almost too 
severe for the comity of a debate in which the parties con- 
stantly called each other "My worthy friend.'* Mr. Owen 
arose with his invincible equanimity of good humor. "At 
that time,'* said he, "being a prophet and availing myself of a 
prophet's phraseology, I spoke of prophetic years. Taking the 
exposition of my worthy friend, the period of my prediction 
includes something like 750 years. The prophecy will be ful- 
filled long before that." Very good, Mr. Owen, we join the 
laugh but cannot help wondering, at the same time, how many 
prophetic years of fabled duration it would take to evolve a 
social millennium out of the twelve fundamental laws of 
human nature, those sparkling jewels of your long forgotten 
casket. 



CHAPTER VII 

THE WAR ON SKEPTICISM 

Divine Revelation and Human Responsibility, the Real Issue 
of the Campbell-Owen Debate. 



I do not imagine it to be necessary to take up much 
of your time in proving that an infant at birth is quite 
incapable of knowing anything about his organization 
or natural capabilities. And yet his character and 
conduct proceed essentially from them; they are the 
only foundation of his virtues and vices. Over the 
formation of these, however, he has had no control, 
nor in the forming of anything that belongs to him- 
self. No being, therefore, so created can ever be made 
tx) become responsible for his nature. 

— Robert Owen, 

My friend has said that the whole pith of the argu- 
ment is concentrated in the corollary, that man did not 
make himself, er^o, is irresponsible. Now this dogma 
puts out of the world and out of human language, 
every idea of responsibility of any kind, or to any 
being whatever. All our social, moral, natural, and 
religious relations, obligations, and dependencies are 
at once annihilated by the besom of this sweeping cor- 
ollary. — Alexander Campbell. 



CHAPTER VII 

THE WAR ON SKEPTICISM 

WHEN Owen, like Goliath of Gath challenged the armies 
of Israel to send out a champion to join battle with 
him, there was but one David in the United States with 
courage and equipment and skill to take up the challenge and 
to meet the boastful giant in mental and moral combat. 

Alexander Campbell, of Bethany, was the only man in the 
country equipped and qualified to meet defiant infidelity in the 
open, and to roll back the tidal wave of atheistic secularism 
threatening to inundate the world. The conviction had al- 
ready been borne in upon him that skepticism had become, or 
was fast becoming, a greater menace to the Christian religion, 
than divisive and wrangling sectarianism. He had been made 
to realize, some time before this debate with Owen, that new 
weapons must be added to his controversial armory to meet 
this Philistine assault on another front. 

No one knew better, or as well indeed, that the orthodox 
clergymen of the time were not armed to do successful battle 
with philosophical doubt and unbelief. They were so incased 
in the Saul's armour of doubtful theologies and fossil creeds 
that they stood a poor chance against the giants, who were bid- 
ding insolent defiance to the armies of the living God. 
Their religion, too, was either mystical or emotional and these 
are "powerful weak" when it comes to an exchange of argu- 
mentative blows. Mr. Campbell had taken note of the situa- 
tion, and had for several years made careful preparation for 
the war with materialistic skepticism, which had already taken 
the East, and was rapidly advancing to the conquest of the 
West. 

The Bolsheviki rationalism of the French Revolution had 
made horizontal advances in widening circles and perpendic- 

79 



80 Debates That Made History 

ular progress up to the level of great educational centers like 
Yale and Harvard, and great intellectual personalities, like 
Thomas Jefferson, Aaron Burr, grandson of Jonathan Ed- 
wards, and Thomas Paine. There were infidel societies in 
the great American institutions of learning named after the 
leaders of the French Revolution. 

In the days of the illustrious Timothy Dwight, there was 
the merest handful of students who were not afraid, or 
ashamed, to acknowledge themselves believers in Jesus Christ. 
Thomas Paine's ^^Age of Reason'' had great vogue in those 
days; in fact, it was handed over the counters of bookstores 
in Cincinnati like hot cakes at a restaurant ; and the same was 
true as far south as Lexington, Ky., long before Alexander 
Campbell preached his first sermon there in 1823. 

Mr. Owen's New Harmony, the city of mental independ- 
ence, had the finest library in North America. Its philo- 
sophic literature was unequalled. Its literary organ. The 
New Harmony Gazette, widely circulated, was edited and con- 
ducted, with distinguished ability, by a group of literary men 
and scholars, imported from Europe. 

In the early numbers of The Christian Baptist, both of the 
Campbells had clashed with this coterie of Owenistic philoso- 
phers, who were as effectively overthrown as their master was 
subsequently in the oral debate in Cincinnati. 

Alexander Campbell's six letters to a skeptic, published in 
The Christian Baptist, and collected into a brochure, in the 
judgment of the writer, was the best campaign document in 
the war with unbelief, which has seen the light for a hundred 
years. The nearest approach, in effectiveness at the time, was 
Walker's 'Thilosophy of the Plan of Salvation," and Nelson's 
**Cause and Cure of Infidelity," gems all in the field of anti- 
infidel literature. The six letters had a world-wide circula- 
tion, long after the oral debate, and have been the means of 
saving more people from *'The gulf of dark despair," of agnos- 
tic materialism and rationalism, than any apologetic known 
to me. 



The War on Skepticism 81 

The outstanding element, in all these debates is the fact, 
everywhere apparent, that Mr. Campbell had taken out a 
brief to defend against all comers, the Bible as a revelation 
of the divine personality and the Word of God for the edifi- 
cation and salvation of men. This w^as the fundamental issue 
in the fight with infidelity, as the interpretation and applica- 
tion of the Bible was in the war with sectarianism. 

He submitted a proposition in the written discussion with 
the editors of The New Harmony Gazette in the form of a 
query or **problem," as he called it, and it probes to the heart 
of the question. Said he: 

You think that reason cannot originate the idea of an Eternal First 
Cause, and that no man could acquire such an idea by the employment 
of his senses and reason; and you think correctly. You think also 
that the Bible is not a supernatural revelation — not a revelation from 
the Deity in any sense. These things premised, gentlemen, I present 
my problem in the form of a query again. The Christian idea of 
an Eternal First Cause uncaused, or of a God, is now in the world 
and has been for ages immemorial. You say it could not enter into 
the world by reason and did not enter by revelation. Now as you 
are philosophers and historians and have all the means of knowing, 
How did it come into the ivorldf" Two forms of a dilemma; on 
which will the philosophers of New Harmony unfurl themselves? 

We are told that the surprise of the skeptics at finding Mr. 
Campbell to concur in the conclusions of their own philosophy, 
was greatly increased when they found their argument thus 
turned against themselves, and that, upon their own principles, 
they became at once involved in a palpable difficulty, from 
which there was no escape. 

They had boasted greatly of their mental independence and 
imagined themselves to occupy a sphere of thought quite above 
that of the religious portion of the community, but, in coming 
into contact with Mr. Campbell, they found themselves con- 
fronted by a mental independence much greater than that 
which they boasted and they were quite at a loss as to how to 
meet his unexpected assaults. 

Caring nothing for arithmetical defenses of the size and 
contents of Noah's ark, or for geological explanations of the 



\ 



82 Debates That Made History 

Mosaic account of the creation, in order to refute the usual 
puerile cavils of skepticism, he had attacked, at once, the ra- 
tionale of their system. Overleaping the out-works, he had 
advanced upon the citadel. The New Harmony Gazette, 
after this taste of his quality, seemed for a time indisposed to 
renew the contest. 

The contest, however, was renewed in the big mill at Cin- 
cinnati. The philosophers had been thinking the matter over 
in the interval, and, when Mr. Campbell read to his opponent 
the problem he had propounded to The Gazette, through the 
columns of The Christian Baptist, and came to the last line: 
''If the idea of God did not enter into the world by reason 
/ nor by revelation, how then did it enter?" Mr. Owen 
promptly interjected, ''By imagination." 

Mr. Campbell had taken that trip down the Ohio River, 
all the way from Virginia, loaded for bear and this was his 
first opportunity for a decent shot. He had tried in vain for 
two or three days, had appealed to Mr. Owen, to the modera- 
tors and to public opinion, to try to get some kind of a logical 
proposition, issue, attitude, statement, or what not, out of his 
supposed antagonist, with which he might grapple in work- 
manlike fashion. But nothing was forthcoming, till this un- 
fortunate ejaculatory commitment by his opponent. The 
God idea, so long in the world, nobody knows when it came, 
entered in, not by reason, philosophy, nor revelation, but by 
the human imagination, and stayed when it got here, I sup- 
pose by ignorance and superstition. 

Mr. Campbell opened the attack on this position with the 
grape and canister of his covenant theology, based on John 
Locke's sensational philosophy and theory of knowledge and 
no high explosive shell of the great war ever did a cleaner or 
more destructive piece of execution. "Indeed," said Mr. 
Campbell, in effect, "since when did imagination ever origi- 
/^ nate anything?" 

With a few swift lightning strokes and flashes, Owen is 
overwhelmed with the unanimous testimony of philosophic 
writers, to the effect that imagination has no creative power. 



The War on Skepticism 83 

It has the power of analyzing, combining, compounding, re- 
casting, new-modifying all the different ideas, presented to it, 
but it has no power to function in the creation of new ideas. 
The first arrow, fired at the imaginary god of the "City of 
Mental Independence," was taken from the quiver of infidel 
Hume: 

Although nothing is so unbounded, in its operations, as the powers 
of the mind and the imagination of man to form monsters, and join 
incongruous shapes, and appearances and, while the body is confined 
to one planet, along which it creeps with pain and difficulty, the 
imagination and thought can transport us, in an instant, into the most 
distant regions of the universe. But, although our thoughts seem to 
possess this unbounded liberty, we shall find, upon a nearer exami- 
nation, that it is really confined within very narrow limits and that 
all this creative po^wer of the mind amounts to nothing more than 
the faculty of combining, transposing, augmenting and diminishing 
the materials afforded us by sense and experience. 

Christian Locke and other philosophers back up infidel 
Hume in the assertion and demonstration that the idea of God 
could never have been created by the human imagination. 
Said Mr. Campbell: 

Now, if this be true and founded on a strict analysis of the human 
mind, and predicated of universal experience — how could man have 
imagined a God?" "Let us try the faculty of imagination," said he, 
"and prove by our own experience its creative pov:er. We have but 
five senses: I would, therefore, ask Mr. Owen, and everyone present, 
if you can by any exertion of your faculties imagine a sixth sense? 
What would it be? If you were to imagine any other sense, it must 
be analogous to those you already possess. You might imagine a 
being like the fabulous Argus, with a hundred eyes; but fancy that 
you possessed an organ like that of Fame which would enable you 
to hear from a greater distance than the eye could reach; but, could 
you have imagined this unless you had derived the simple idea of 
hearing from your organ of hearing? But a sixth sense, unlike those 
possessed, cannot be imagined. Now if Mr. Owen cannot, from his 
five senses, imagine a sixth sense, how can he assert that a savage or 
philosopher could imagine God? But I call upon Mr. Owen to im- 
agine and report to us a sixth sense. 

However much imagining Mr. Owen may have done on 
the subject, he did no reporting. He went on reading his 



84 Debates That Made History 

manuscript, exhibiting the "jewels** of his "casket" and ex- 
pounding his twelve divine laws of human nature. These 
laws, as applicable to a goat as to a man, utterly irrelevant to 
any point at issue, like the poor, are always with us to the 
very end of the discussion. They are all harmless enough ex- 
cept the one that denies, by implication at least, the freedom 
of the human will. 

A theological and psychological expert, like Mr. Campbell, 
who on many a strenuous field, had unhorsed the necessitarian 
dogma of John Calvin, would have little trouble in dashing 
to the ground an infidel fatalism, that cut the nerve of moral 
responsibility; a favorite corollary, which Mr. Owen deduced 
from his views of necessity, or the fact that man did not cre- 
ate himself, nor his circumstances, was that neither praise nor 
blame, merit nor demerit can be ascribed to him. 

Mr. Campbell pointed out, upon this assumption, that there 
could be no such thing as gratitude nor kind feeling, charity 
nor benevolence due to any human being more than to the 
fountain or rivulet, which slakes our thirst, nor to the tree 
which yields us its fruit. He showed that Mr. Owen's plan 
of cultivating the kind feelings would extirpate all feeling and 
that, as to sympathies, we would stand towards each other like 
trees in the forest. The artillery of the old mental philosophy 
of Locke and Hume and Mirabeau, was thus turned upon 
Mr. Owen and his New Harmony with great effect. 

It is a notew^orthy fact, at this point, that so far in the pe- 
rusal of these bulky volumes of debate of hundreds of pages, 
I have not once come across the word psychology nor any of 
its derivatives. 

Much water has flown under bridges since 1829 and many 
changes have taken place in the progress of scientific and theo- 
logical studies. A static theology is giving place to a dynamic 
religion, the old mental philosophy to a new experimental psy- 
chology and the new conception of evolution has done yeoman 
service in the ongoing of things in all departments of human 
thought. The subliminal intellect, the two planes of concious- 



The War on Skepticism 85 

ness, the subjective mind telepathy, the power of thought to 
project itself through space by means of rhythmic waves, like 
wireless telegraphy through ether, while modifying old posi- 
tions materially in a few particulars confirm, in a remarkable 
way, the substantive contentions of Alexander Campbell, in 
his war against atheistic materialism, a hundred years ago. 

The old controversy between necessity and free will, in the 
form in which it bulked so largely in this debate, has been put 
out of court in the new investigations of man's imminent 
powers. Mr. Owen's God, '^Circumstances,'' being a poison- 
ous serpent has had his fangs drawn by the new psychology. 
Man is not born free, the constitution of the United States to 
the contrary notwithstanding, but he is born with the capacity 
and the ability to achieve freedom. 

The fundamental office and place of religion is to awaken 
this power within, and teach men that the supreme task of 
life is the attainment of freedom, the achievement of liberty 
by such means as divine revelation through Jesus Christ, puts 
into our hands or, rather, into our souls. Christ said to his con- 
temporaries, *'You shall know the truth and the truth shall 
make you free," and "If the truth makes you free you shall be 
free indeed." These people had not inherited freedom at 
birth, nor had they acquired it since. They were the bond 
slaves of ignorance, prejudice and sin, the devil's trinity for 
keeping men in bondage. If "the truth" of God, through the 
personality and power and divine idealism of Jesus Christ, 
could have found its way into their souls the darkness of ig- 
norance would have vanished, the narrowness and meanness 
of prejudice rooted out, and all the minions of sin and death 
put to flight, — knowing the truth they could walk forth, free 
^nd righteous, in the universe of God. 

Alexander Campbell's contention, with which he overthrew 
the materialistic and fatalistic philosophy of his opponent, may 
be summed up in a sentence: Divine revelation, an objective 
reality in the first place, and in the second, a subjective expe- 
rience, through which the life and truth of God enters into 
the soul of man and makes him free. 



CHAPTER VIII 

THE GREAT TWELVE-HOUR SPEECH 

The Longest on Record, except One. Mr. Campbell's Mas- 
terpiece of Constructive Argument. 



When I hear persons caviling at the present state 
of things, and objecting to matters which they do not 
understand, I figure to myself a person stationed in a 
small room, say ten feet square, before which is pass- 
ing continually a map ten thousand square miles in 
extent; ten feet of which only, at a time, can be seen 
through an opening in one side. In this small room he 
sits and peruses this map, for seventy years. For many 
weeks at a time he sees nothing but immense oceans of 
water; then apparently boundless forests; then prodi- 
gious chains of mountains; then deserts, flats, wastes, 
and wildernesses. Here and there a succession of beau- 
tiful country passes before his eyes. After contem- 
plating this map for seventy years, he exclaims, What 
an irrational, ill-conducted, and incongruous looking 
thing is this! I have seen forests, deserts, and oceans, 
interspersed here and there with some specks of beau- 
tiful country. I must conclude that the Creator of this 
planet was either unwise or not benevolent. But, sup- 
pose, that on a sudden, the walls of his cottage fell 
down, and his vision was enlarged and strengthened 
so as to comprehend, in one glance, the whole sweep 
of ten thousand square miles; what a wonderful revo- 
lution would he undergo! Infinite wisdom and design 
now appear, where before he saw nothing but confu- 
sion and deformity. So it is with him who sits judging 
on the moral government of the world. 

— Alexander Campbell, 



CHAPTER VIII 

THE GREAT TWELVE-HOUR SPEECH 

WHEN Mr. Owen came to the end of his written piece, 
he had exhausted himself and was compelled to hand 
over the affirmative to his opponent. He had shot his 
bolt — bolts rather, twelve of them, and had shot them so often, 
as we have seen, that each additional repetition towards the 
last brought a puncturing guffaw from the audience. 

It had long been manifest that Mr. Owen v/as no debater. 
He had no argumentative resources, no dialectic skill, no readi- 
ness of extemporaneous speech; he did not know reason and 
logic from a hole in the ground. He expounded his twelve 
laws, the basic elements of his social system, his Bolsheviki 
communism to the end of his paper covering the ground of 
twenty-two addresses, thirty minutes each in length, a rehash 
of the material he had used in a course of lectures he had de- 
livered in New Orleans and in other cities of Europe and 
America. 

In Mr. Campbell's twenty-second address he took the affirm- 
ative and commenced the historic speech of the century, not 
only in duration but in illuminative and constructive power 
of solid and brilliant argumentation. There is only one paral- 
lel in length and none in strength. A few years ago an Aus- 
trian Senator delivered a speech from the floor of the Senate 
chamber, in Vienna, in which he spoke twelve consecutive hours 
with only an interval of fifteen or twenty minutes for refresh- 
ments. Mr. Campbell's long address was really a succession 
of two hour speeches from 10 to 12 and from 2 to 4 for three 
successive days, aggregating twelve hours in all. As a phe- 
nomenon of physical endurance the Austrian leads, as an 
exhibition of intellectual and spiritual genius of massive schol- 
arship, and argumentative power, Mr. Campbell's great de- 

89 



90 Debates That Made History 

liverance probably outclasses anything of its kind on record. 
As an effort in the science of Christian apologetics it is worthy 
of careful study, even in this age of progress, when everything 
is put to the acid test of scientific investigation. 

After a few preliminaries winding up the odds and ends of 
the old discussion, which had just been brought to a close, Mr. 
Campbell submitted his thesis, or plan of argument, under 
four heads : 

1. I shall call your attention to the historic evidence of the Chris- 
tian religion. 

2. I shall next give a brief outline of the prophetic evidences, or 
rather the evidence arising from the prophecies, found in the in- 
spired volume. 

3. We shall then draw some arguments from the genius and 
tendency of the Christian religion. 

4. And in conclusion, pay some attention to "The Social System." 

I have before me the difficult task of literary condensation 
to such an extent, and in such proportions that I am afraid it 
will be quite impossible to do anything like adequate justice 
to this powerful statement of the Christian evidences. This 
twelve hour speech occupies over 200 pages, nearly half the 
volume, of the Campbell and Owen debate. There are so 
many brilliant sentences; destructive, argumentative blows; 
quotable passages; informative facts and testimonies; annihila- 
ting and dynamic statements that blow up the whole structure 
of infidelity in one fell explosive detonation ; so much elabora- 
tion in demonstration of the spirit and of power, which one 
hesitates to spoil or desecrate by trying to condense, that I 
hardly know where to begin or how to proceed in the embar- 
rassment of riches in the material before me. 

The first proposition, taken up in this argumentative master- 
piece, is the most vital and basic and determinative of the 
historical integrity of our holy Christianity: ''The volume 
called the New Testament was written by the persons whose 
names it bears, and at the time in which it is said to have been 
written/^ One of the chief difficulties in approaching the solu- 
tion of this question, is the state of mind of the investigator. 



The Great Twelve-Hour Speech 91 

Mr. Campbell, with characteristic frankness, declares that 
religious men are afraid to call its truth in question, they are 
prejudiced in its favor. This religious awe acts as a sort of 
illusion on their minds. On the contrary, skeptics are preju- 
diced against it. That prejudice disqualifies them to judge 
fairly and impartially upon the merits of the evidence. The 
religious awe of the Christian and the prejudices of the skeptic 
are real obstacles in the way of both in judging impartially of 
the weight of evidence in favor of this or any other position, 
at the bottom of the Christian faith. Who ever heard of a 
disputant, in the whole history of controversy, religious and 
otherwise, having the intellectual and moral honesty and out- 
spoken candor, to voluntarily admit that there might be blind- 
ness on his side as well as on the side of his opponent ? 

The sectarian partizan disputer of this world is always blind 
to his own prejudices, and those of his friends, and altogether 
open eyed and outspoken as to the sinful and shameful bias of 
the opposition. Alexander Campbell is the solitary exception 
as far as they are known to me in the *'logomachic tilts" of 
the world. He took up the New Testament as though he had 
never seen the volume before, as though he knew nothing of 
its history, its contents, or its value ; sustaining no other rela- 
tion to it than that of an impartial, disinterested critic and 
investigator. This is the scientific temper and the only temper 
in which the solution of any problem should be approached. 

His first proposition is concrete, it is one of fact : 

A book or collection of books, known as the New Testament is 
noiv in existence. This is indisputable. It is an old book. It has 
been here a long time. This equally is beyond dispute. When, 
where, how and by whom did these narratives, treatises, and epistles 
originate? 

To begin with, Celsus, the first Gentile infidel to write in 
opposition to the Christian religion, who wrote eighteen cen- 
turies from our day and one century from the time of Christ, 
refers to the affairs of JesuSj as written by his disciples. From 
the extracts which he makes in his book, there can be no doubt 



92 Debates That Made History 

but that he refers to one or the other of the four gospels. Mr. 
Campbell quotes the great Dr. Chalmers as commenting: 

The distinct assertion of Celsus, being an enemy of Christianity, 
that the pieces in question were written by the companions of Jesus, 
though even at the distance of a hundred years, is an argument in 
favor of their authenticity, which cannot be alleged for many of the 
most esteemed compositions of antiquity. 

In these few words of infidel Celsus we have a cord stretch- 
ing across nineteen centuries and attaching itself to the com- 
panions of Jesus, at the other end, and strong enough to bear 
the whole weight of the argument for the authorship and 
genuineness of the gospels. This, however, is only a meager 
beginning. Mr. Campbell called attention to a book, lying on 
the table before him, a volume of the writings of the primitive 
disciples of Christ, and first teachers of Christianity, the con- 
temporaries and successors of the Apostles. Lifting up the 
volume, Mr. Campbell said: 

Here is the testimony of Barnabas, of Clement, Hermas, Ignatius 
and Polycarp — Barnabas the companion of Paul, Clement the Bishop 
of the congregation in Rome, whom all antiquity agrees to be the 
person mentioned by Paul (Phil. 4:3) ; Hermas whom Paul mentions 
in his epistle to the Romans; Ignatius, Bishop of Antioch, who flour- 
ished there A.D. 75, who took the oversight of that congregation 
thirty-seven years after the ascension of Christ. Polycarp, Bishop 
of Smyrna, w^ho had seen, conversed with, and was familiar with 
some of the apostles, — all these directly quote the historical or epis- 
tolary books of the New Testament — and refer to these writings as 
of general notoriet}'. 

To these, the speaker adds the testimony of Papias, the 
hearer of John, of Irenaeus, Justin and others of their con- 
temporaries. They either quote New Testament books, famil- 
iar to us, by saying, *^as it is written,'' or by name. A few 
examples may be given. Barnabas, in his epistle says: "Let 
us therefore beware lest it come upon us as it is written, 
'There are many called but few chosen.' " In the letter, 
written by Clement from Rome to Corinth, in the name of 
the whole congregation in Rome, to the whole congregation in 



i 



The Great Twelve-Hour Speech 93 

Corinth, say, from five hundred Christians in Rome to five 
hundred Christians in Corinth, the Sermon on the Mount is 
directly quoted and other passages of the testimony of Mat- 
thew and Luke. More than forty clear allusions to the books 
of the New Testament are to be found in the simple fragment 
of Polycarp, and Polycarp, be it remembered, was well ac- 
quainted with the apostle John. There are more quotations 
in TertuUian, of the second century, from the New Testament, 
than are to be found of the writings of Cicero in all the writers 
of two or three centuries. The poems of Virgil and Horace, 
the Annals of Tacitus, the orations of Cicero, the most popu- 
lar works of antiquity, can not afford half the proof that they 
are the genuine works of the persons whose names they bear 
as can be adduced to prove the authorship of the memoirs of 
Jesus Christ written by Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. 

The case is strong enough, it is hardly possible to conceive 
of it being made stronger, and yet a great body of additional 
testimony of the same kind was brought in by Mr. Campbell. 
f he could have projected his vision sixty years into the future, 
so as to take in more recent periods of historical inquii^ and 
research, he could have added solidity and strength more in- 
vincible to the basic proof of his first proposition. 

The concessions and testimonies, forced from rationalistic 
critics in our time, have added immensely to the historic evi- 
dence for the authenticity and genuineness of New Testament 
books and the fundamental facts of Christianity. Harnack, 
for instance, the greatest of living masters as rationalistic critic 
and historian, in a book written twenty years ago or more, 
pushed the date of Paul's conversion back to within eighteen 
months of the resurrection of Christ. This is fatal to all 
mythical and legendary interpretations of Christianity. One 
year and six months is not time enough for myth and legend to 
get in their work. This makes Paul a witness of tremendous 
weight and importance, in his epistles which have come down 
to us. And what about the historicity of these Pauline epis- 
tles? All schools of criticism — rationalistic, destructive, mate- 



94 Debates That Made History 

rialistic, evangelical and all, are a unit in acclaiming the Paul- 
ine authorship of the four great "Epistles of the contention," 
as they are called — Romans, the two Corinthians and Gala- 
tians. 

The two most significantly evidential facts of that early 
date were the resurrection of Jesus and the conversion of Saul 
of Tarsus, and these two monumental facts of the faith are 
buttressed irrefragably in these four great epistles of the con- 
tention, now universally admitted to be of Pauline authorship. 
If historical human testimony has either value or significance, 
the case was made out ninety-one years ago, but it shines in 
clearer and more powerful light at the end of the second 
decade of the 20th century. 

If any one is interested in this basic issue of the faith and 
wishes to study the problems treated in one of the mightiest 
arguments ever constructed to prove the historical integrity of 
the New Testament and the factual reality of our Lord's 
resurrection, he could not do better than to concentrate his 
attention, for a time, upon this masterly apologetic. To sum- 
marize it in few words and at the same time retain its strength 
is altogether an impossible task. 

The same is true of the argument from the fulfilment of 
prophecy. The present day student of Hebrew prophecy 
stresses the didactic and revelative functions of the prophet, 
and cares little for him as a prognosticator of future events. 
The apologetic scribe of our time touches lightly upon ful- 
filled prophecies as proof of the supernatural inspiration of the 
Bible, if indeed, he does not omit it altogether. This may be 
owing in part, at least, to the romantic, visionary, prophecy- 
mongering crank who makes a fool of himself and of the 
whole business of a divine revelation as it stands related to 
*'the plan of the ages." But, notwithstanding the admitted 
fact of the changed attitude of scholarship to this branch of 
the subject, one can not read Mr. Campbell's great argument 
without being gripped by the old conviction of the evidential 



The Great Twelve-Hour Speech 95 

weight and value of the undoubted fulfillment of these pro- 
phetic scriptures. We have space only for a single instance 
given partly in Mr. Campbeirs own words. 

It is Daniel's wonderful vision of Nebuchadnezzer's image 
and his interpretation of the strange phenomenon. In this 
vision there was a prospective view of the history of the 
world, from the time of the Chaldean or Assyrian monarchy 
down to the end of time. That this vision and prophecy 
might sufficiently attract the attention and interest the feelings 
of all the world it was vouchsafed to an Assyrian king, and 
explained by a Jewish prophet. The Jews and Gentiles are 
both concerned in it. Nebuchadnezzar had the vision and 
Daniel gave the interpretation. Thus Babylon and Jerusalem 
attest its truth. In this vision, and the interpretation, the four 
great pagan universal empires are most accurately defined. 
The golden head of the image represented the then existing 
Chaldean dominion; the silver shoulders and arms were the 
Medo-Persian dynasty; the brass, in the image, represented 
the brazen coated Greeks, the Macedonian empire, under 
Philip and Alexander ; the iron legs and feet the Roman world 
dominion, the last of the universal brute monarchies of the 
world. 

The prophet then speaks of the "stone kingdom" represented 
by the little stone cut out of the mountain without hands and 
thus supernatural in origin, spiritual in character, universal in 
extent, indestructible in destiny. It was to destroy the princi- 
ple of universal world dominion by brute force, and it did. 
Take up your secular history, please, as the best interpreter 
of sacred prophecy, and you will find that all of these empires 
came and went just as Daniel said they would. Christ was 
born in the year 31 of Rome. The stone kingdom, the Mes- 
sianic reign, Christianity, the gospel of divine revelation, was 
rocked in the Roman cradle for four hundred years, till it at- 
tained potency and power to overthrow the last and greatest 
of the world dominions, and, with the overthrow of the organi- 
zation went the autocratic principle on which it was founded. 



96 Debates That Made History 

Strenuous efforts have been made by brute violence to bring 
back brute world dominion, but in vain, including the pan- 
Germanism of the late war. I may be reminded, and probably 
will be, that modern criticism has pushed forward the date of 
the book of Daniel to near the close of the Persian period, 
about two hundred years before Christ. Upon this assump- 
tion the impersonator of Daniel had two world monarchies 
behind him as history. At the same time, if this be admitted, 
it must be borne in mind that he had three ahead of him, the 
Macedonian, the Roman, and the Christian, stretching over 
six hundred years to the end of Rome. This validates the 
prophecy as sound argument for the inspiration of the proph- 
et. The stone kingdom is still here, the Christian religion, 
as represented by the Christian church, is the world's only 
universal empire. There will never be another 'til the Mil- 
lennium puts in an appearance. 



CHAPTER IX 

MR. CAMPBELL'S THIRD ARGUMENT IN THE 
CAMPBELL-OWEN DEBATE 

The Intrinsic Reasonableness and Practical Fitness of the 
Christian Religion. High Explosive Shells Wreck the Last 
Vestige of the Social System. 



A Christian population is emphatically, in practice, 
a population preying upon each other, and living very 
generally in a state of unnatural anxiety, or useless and 
surplus property, in the midst of hourly deception and 
hypocrisy; hating and disliking each other because 
they cannot think and feel alike, having been taught 
the notion that they may think and feel as they please. 
It is everywhere a population of inequality of condi- 
tion, and, necessarily, of pride, poverty, envy, and jeal- 
ousy. It is a population in which tenfold more of ex- 
ertion and anxiety is required from each to produce the 
misery they experience, than is necessary to secure a 
full supply of the best of everything for all. 

— Robert Oiven. 

Christianity has its direct and its indirect influences 
upon society. The direct or the reflex light of this 
holy religion affects ajmost every man in the region 
where it shines. It shines into the hearts of some, and 
in their lives it is reflected as from a mirror upon all 
around. And thus some are Christianized, more are 
moralized, and all are, in some good degree civilized 
by its light. A single pious man in a village is a re- 
straint upon the wickedness and profanity of all the 
villagers. I have known some instances, and have 
heard of others, where a general deterioration of mor- 
als has followed the death or removal of a good man 
out of a small town or neighborhood. There is a 
charm, there is an indescribable influence in the gen- 
uine fruits of Christianity, which, when exhibited in 
living Christians, the most abandoned are constrained 
to respect. Hence an increase of genuine Christians is 
one of the greatest national blessings — if, indeed, it 
be a truth that righteousness exalteth a nation. 

— Alexander Campbell. 



CHAPTER IX 

MR. CAMPBELL'S THIRD ARGUMENT IN THE CAMPBELL- 
OWEN DEBATE 

AFTER the genuineness and authenticity of the New 
Testament had been built up on foundations of unim- 
peachable historic testimony, and the prevision of the an- 
cient prophets, shown in the fulfillment of their prophecies, 
to be out of the range of our ordinary human powers, and 
therefore of divine origin and inspiration; he proceeds to his 
third evidential proposition : "The genius and tendency of the 
Christian religion." This argument of demonstration focuses 
the appeal on experience, the source of all real knowledge. 
It makes evident the fact that the evangel of the Christian 
message is the only force in the world that goes manfully to 
the root of the difficulty, the solution of the sin problem, which 
Owen and the philosophy of his social system either ignored 
or denied. 

All such brainless and bogus schemes of world betterment, 
more numerous and brazen now than in the days of the 
Campbell and Owen debate, start out by shutting their eyes 
to the cancer of moral evil, the most radical and destructive 
of human limitations. They put a cheap economic plaster 
over the running sore, bank up against it a gospel of dirt, 
and then proceed to acclaim the failure of Christianity, and 
the origin of all religions in ignorance and superstition. Over 
against this atheistic whangdoodleism, the gospel of Jesus 
Christ honestly and bravely faces the fact of sin and all the 
depravities of moral evil and the animal nature; faces the 
problem with the only solution, redemption through Christ, 
regeneration by the Holy Spirit, deliverance from the power 
and practice of sin, by the life of God in the soul of man, 
this life within manifesting itself in a righteousness without, 
that walks humbly, deals justly, and loves mercy. 

99 



100 Debates That Made History 

Mr. Campbell contended, with characteristic eloquence and 
power, that genuine Christianity is founded upon the most 
philosophic view of human nature. He declared : 

It aims not at reforming or happifying the world by a system 
of legal restraints, however excellent, but its immediate object is to 
implant in the human heart, through a discovery of the divine 
philanthropy, a principle of love which fulfills every moral precept 
ever promulgated on earth. 

Again he said : 

Here is the grand secret. The religion of Jesus Christ melts the 
hearts of men into pure philanthropy. It converts a lion into a lamb. 
It has done this in our time in countless instances. Mr. Owen only- 
dreams of reformations. Christianity alone changes, regenerates and 
reforms wicked men. The materialists declare their system "Cannot 
make a 'wicked man good" Skepticism never converted a wicked 
man since the days of Celsus till now. Mr. Owen cannot produce 
one instance. But Christianity, taking hold of the heart of man, not 
by law, but by love, not by letter, but by favor, has converted mil- 
lions of the worst characters into the very best. Yes, the religion of 
Jesus sheds abroad in the human heart the love of God ; and that 
love, purifying the heart, overflows in all good actions — kind, humane, 
benevolent, not only to the good, but to the evil. This is the true 
philosophy. Correct the spring, the fountain, "make the tree good," 
engraft a new scion on the old stock; enfuse new life; warm the 
heart by the wonderful love of God, exhibited and sealed by the 
blood of his Son. Let this love, this pure benevolence, this genuine 
philanthropy but reach the soul of man and then all is pure within 
and moral without. 

How does this sound in contrast to the irresponsible and 
soulless animalism of Owen and his successors? As we have 
already seen, Mr. Owen's peculiarity in answering arguments 
and rebutting evidence was the idiosyncrasy of not answering 
and rebutting at all, except the quid nunc method of as- 
sertion and declamation. He asserted and declaimed and 
many times repeated his assertions and declamations. If at 
any time he was tempted to essay a direct reply, he only laid 
himself open to a new and crushing rejoinder, as for instance, 
he replied to the argument on the miraculous by saying he 



Mr. Campbell's Third Argument 101 

did not believe in miracles because he had never seen one. 
'^Miracles were contrary to experience," he declared. That 
of course, reminded his opponent of the King of Siam who 
ordered the Dutch navigator, who asserted that water in 
Holland occasionally became passable for men and horses, to 
be punished for lying. His majesty, living in the tropics had 
never seen ice, he concluded, therefore, that congealed water 
thick enough to bear men and horses was contrary to experi- 
ence. It was contrary to his experience, but not to the ex- 
perience of the Dutchman who had walked and driven horses 
across many a frozen stream in his native land. Poor Mr. 
Owen did not have the penetration to say with his philo- 
sophic master, David Hume, that it was easier to believe that 
the witnesses to miracles were mistaken, than to believe the 
alleged wonders to which they testified. And, this would 
be quite true, if we were always compelled to take the line 
of least resistance; but there are exceptions to that ancient 
materialistic rule, and the most conspicuous exception is the 
well established historic miracle of the resurrection of Jesus 
Christ. If we begin with the presupposition as Renan did, 
and all materialists must, that miracles do not occur; that the 
supernatural is the unnatural and the impossible, then neither 
the witness of experience nor the testimony of observation can 
have the slightest weight with them. No matter if mountain 
high and irresistible in weight, they brush it aside with a 
wave of the hand as unworthy of a moment *s consideration. 

Naturally one cannot help wondering as he reads this long 
and mighty speech of Alexander Campbell as to the impres- 
sion this cumulative and crushing weight of reasoning is going 
to have on the mind of his opponent, and what line of defense 
and rebuttal he will take up in reply. If, however, we have 
caught our Ephraim's point of view and his relation to his 
idol, we can readily anticipate the attitude he will take to- 
wards arguments based on experience and observation of facts, 
if they happen to contradict his assumptions. He coolly ig- 
nored them as worthless and false, and as confirmation of his 



102 Debates That Made History 

unbelief. Here are two sentences he wrote in response to 
Mr. Campbeirs twelve hour speech: 

Then, my friends, my impressions are that Christianity is not 
of divine origin ; that it is not true ; and that its doctrines are now 
anything but beneficial to mankind. On the contrary, my impressions 
are deeply confirmed that its miracles and mysteries are of man's 
contrivance, to impose on the great mass of mankind, who have never 
yet been taught to reason ; to enable the few to govern the many 
through their interested hopes and fears for the future ; and to 
induce the many to prostrate their minds before an order of men, 
who through these means can easily keep them in subjection to the 
powers that be. 

The old infidel theory of imposture for the selfish ends of 
the impostor. No decent infidel, since Owen, has dared to 
repeat that charge against the Christian religion. One of the 
rawest and most ridiculous of the grievances of our benevo- 
lent skeptic was the practice of weekly preaching without the 
privilege of reply by the audience. He refers to this priestly 
outrage upon human liberty again and again. With loud 
voice he said: 

My friends, I do say again, that so long as this weekly preaching, 
without reply from the congregation shall be allowed to proceed, 
you and your posterity will be kept in the very depth of darkness 
as you are at this hour. 

He declared again on the same page: 

This kind of preaching has no other effect — it can have no other 
in practice than to perpetuate the dark ages of ignorance and hy- 
pocrisy. 

Mr. Campbell on a Sunday during the debate preached a 
sermon of marvellous power, as he did at Lexington after 
the McCalla debate, lifting a great audience onto a higher 
mount of inspiration and transfiguration than it had ever ex- 
perienced before. Of this sublime outburst of sacred elo- 
quence in the exposition of holy truth and divine righteousness, 
Mr. Owen coolly observes: 



Mr, CampbelVs Third Argument 103 

Never did I see so much fine talent so miserably misdirected. 
Never did I see human beings so ready to receive poison, under the 
undoubting supposition that it was good and wholesome food. 

And as if that was not enough, he went on to more of the 
same kind. Said he: 

Now, I am persuaded that neither Mr. Campbell, nor the 
larger part of his congregation, were in the least conscious that 
throughout his sermon on Sunday morning he reasoned as falsely 
and spoke as much error as could well be spoken in the same length 
of time. 

These were the impressions made on his mind and the only 
wonder is why he did not spot and specify these errors and 
make a slight effort at least, to show why and wherein they 
were erroneous. He had the coveted privilege of reply, and 
many opportunities, for the lack of which the church-going 
world had gone to wreck and ruin. Why didn^t he show *em 
how? If the congregations of that day had been made up of 
people of the same or similar mental type as Robert Owen 
and Co., and this world redeeming privilege of talking back 
had been granted, the only use made of it would have been 
something like this: 

Mr. Preacher, you are as blind as a bat, your sermon is all 
wrong, I do not believe one word you have said. It is the appeal 
of cunning, craft, and selfishness to ignorance, prejudice, and super- 
stition. Excuse me, please. 

If church assemblies, meeting to worship God and receive 
instruction in the divine way of life, had been turned into 
quiz clubs and debating societies, the church would have gone 
the way of all the earth long before New Harmony and the 
City of Mental Independence had so much dying grace 
granted to them. 

During intervals, between speeches, in the long address of 
three days' duration, Mr. Owen industriously devoted himself 
to composition; so that when Mr. Campbell stopped speaking 
Mr. Owen was ready to begin reading. He had committed 
enough material to paper to last him through three thirty 
minute addresses. He paid a high compliment to his opponent 



104 Debates That Made History 

in truth, his praises soon banked into eulogy and then passed 
to the ecstatic and flaming heights of panegyric. He spoke of 
Mr. Campbell's great learning, marvellous industry, extra- 
ordinary talents, shining gifts, manifest sincerity, honesty, 
self-control, and scrupulous fairness in debate ; lifted him onto 
a pinnacle by himself, as the only Christian minister in Amer- 
ica, with the courage of his convictions, with the moral brav- 
ery and sincerity to come forward in defense of his imperilled 
religion. He thanked Mr. Campbell for buckling on his 
armor and coming to the front, as it gave him a long coveted 
opportunity to save the world by the proclamation of his 
twelve fundamental laws, and the promulgation of the prin- 
ciples of his social system. After this, he went on to use the 
language I have just quoted, which he pointed and tipped 
with the polite declaration that his "friend'' hadn't a ray of 
light and was as blind as a mole. Of course, he did not blame 
poor benighted Mr. Campbell. He could not and dare not, 
according to his own philosophy, blame anybody for anything. 
Man being an automatic machine, an organized clod with no 
soul but his breath, and no heaven but the grave, virtue and 
goodness deserve no credit, vice and wickedness no discredit. 

Over and over again, with tiresome iteration and reitera- 
tion, did Mr. Owen repeat the fundamental doctrine of all 
infidelity — if negation can be called doctrine — the denial of 
free agency and moral responsibility. Almost as many times 
did his opponent shatter this pretentious pedestal of unbelief 
to its base. He said, to give an instance or two: 

Mr. Owen contends that a society can exist without an idea of 
obligation or responsibility. This is contrary to all the past records 
of time and all present experience. A banditti of highway robbers 
could not exist without the ligament of laws, and the tie of moral 
obligation. Without them it would be impossible for them to con- 
cert a scheme of co-operative plunder. 

'Tor not since Adam made his verdant apron 
Has man with man in social union dwelt, 
But laws were made to draw that union closer." 



Mr, Campbell's Third Argument 105 

No society has ever existed or ever can exist without some sense 
of responsibility and obligation. We talk of a lawless banditti, but 
this is to be understood sub mode. They are not without laws, and 
rigorous ones too, among themselves; they well know that they 
could not exist without them. 

Whether the doctrine of free will is true or false in meta- 
physics, whether man is a free agent or a mere automaton, 
there is one thing absolutely certain, and that is that no asso- 
ciation of men or organization of society, can be held together 
for a single day without the practical recognition of individual 
freedom and moral responsibility. Whatever may be the ab- 
stract proposition of philosophy this is the concrete reality of 
experience and it did not take many years either for Mr. 
Owen to find it out. 

After the eulogistic appreciation of Mr. Campbell and his 
powers, and the wholesale interpretation of Christendom as 
blind and rotten, he proceeds to the eleventh exposition of his 
twelve divine laws, the basic elements of his animal social 
system. A humorous impulse seizing Mr. Campbell he arose 
and remarked that he would beg leave to suggest that these 
laws should not be commented on more than eleven times. 
In spite of the protest of his opponent and the laughter of 
his crowd, the founder of the city of mental independence 
went on holding up to admiration the twelve jewels of his 
casket. But Mr. Campbell got even with him and it was the 
unkindest cut of all, when he proceeded, in the last speech 
but one, to parody the twelve laws by substituting goat and 
kid for man and child. He wrote a new title : 

''The twelve fundamental laws of brutal nature on which 
Robert Owen bases a change of society that will form an en- 
tire new state of existence!' I am sorry there is not space 
for all the amended **laws." Half of them will do as speci- 
mens of the whole : 

1. That a goat, at birth, is ignorant of everything relative to its 
own organization, and that it has not been permitted to create the 
slightest part of any of its natural propensities, faculties, or qual- 
ities, physical or mental. 



106 Debates That Made History 

2. That no two kids, at birth, have yet been known to possess 
precisely the same organization ; while the physical, mental and 
moral differences between all kids are formed without their knowl- 
edge or will. 

3. That each individual kid is placed at birth without its knowl- 
edge or consent within circumstances which acting upon its peculiar 
organization, impress the general character of those circumstances 
upon the infant kid and goat; yet that the influence of those cir- 
cumstances, to a certain degree modified by the peculiar natural 
organization of each individual goat. 

4. That no kid has the power of deciding just what period of 
time or in what part of the world it shall come into existence, of 
what goat it shall be born, what peculiar tricks it shall be trained 
to, or by what other circumstances it shall be surrounded from 
birth to death. 

5. That each individual goat is so created that when young it 
may be made to receive impressions to produce either true ideas 
or false notions and beneficial or injurious habits and retain them 
w^th great tenacity. 

6. That each individual goat is so created that he must feel, ac- 
cording to the strongest impressions, that can be made on its feel- 
ings and other faculties while its feeling in no case depends upon 
its will. 

Once, in a conversation with me, a Bolsheviki Owenite 
made this speech: 

If I have food in me stomach, a rag on me back, a roof over me 
head, a dollar or two in me pocket, and a reasonable prospect of 
a day's work ahead — that is all the religion I want, all the God 
I believe in. 

My reply was: 

If a Billy goat or a baboon could talk, that is just what he would 
say almost word for word. He would embrace your religion and 
acknowledge your God. Are you nothing more and nothing different 
from a Billy goat or a baboon on two legs? 



CHAPTER X 

CAMPBELL-OWEN DEBATE CONCLUDED 

Choice Selections from the Written Introduction and Mr. 
Campbell's Speeches. 



Now I must tell you that a problem will arise in 
the minds of those living five hundred or a thousand 
miles distant, wbo may read this discussion, whether 
it ivas o^ing to a perfect apathy or indifference on 
your part, as to any interest you felt in the Christian 
religion, that you bore all these insults ^without seeming 
to hear them. In fine, the question will be, ^whether it 
fwas o^wing to the stoical indifference of fatalism, to 
the prevalence of infidelity; or, to the meekness and 
forbearance luhich Christianity teaches, that you bore 
all these i?tdignities ^without a single expression of dis- 
gust. Now I desire no more than that this good and 
Christian like deportment may be credited to the proper 
account. If it be owing to your concurrence in senti- 
ment with Mr. Owen, let skepticism have the honor of 
it. But if owing to your belief in, or regard for, the 
Christian religion, let the Christian religion have the 
honor of it. These things premised, my proposition is 
that all the persons in this assembly ivho believe in the 
Christian religion or voho feel so much interest in it, 
as to ivish to see it pervade the fworld, fivill please to 
signify it by standing up. (An almost universal ris- 
ing up.3 

Here Mr. Campbell says, You will have the good- 
ness to be seated. 

Now I would further propose, that all persons 
doubtful of the truth of the Christian religion, or vjho 
do not believe it, and vuho are not friendly to its spread 
and prevalence over the vuorld, vuill please signify it 
by rising up. (Three arise.) 

Mr. Owen rises. 

Gentlemen moderators — It has just occurred to me 
that I had forgotten to tender my thanks to you for 
your presence and superintendence on this occasion, 
which I now beg leave to do. And I may add, I am 
much pleased with Mr. Campbell's little maneuver of 
the test, because I discover it pleases him and his 
friends. Truth requires no such support. {Candles 
called for.) 
— Closing Scene of The Campbell and Ov:en Debate. 



CHAPTER X 

CAMPBELL-OWEN DEBATE CONCLUDED 
Christianity and Infidelity Contrasted 

WHEN we ask, What has Christianity produced in the 
soil of our fallen nature?' or, 'What has Christianity 
done for man?' we do not institute a comparison between 
a Christian and a hypocrite but between a sincere Chris- 
tian and a sincere pagan or between a sincere Christian 
community and a sincere infidel community. We do not insti- 
tute a comparison between a half converted Christian and a 
half bred infidel. We ask for a well developed Christian and 
a well developed infidel and then, without debate, submit the 
question to a well qualified and disinterested umpire. We 
are willing to test the tree by its fruits. Pretended Chris- 
tians and pretended infidels, or Christians clothed in 
the attire of infidels, or infidels, attired in the garb of 
Christians, form no logical contrast and come not within the 
purview of our premises, our reasonings or our conclusions. 
This would be mere trifling, with a grave and transcendantly 
important subject. 

"I have never read nor heard a philosophical, rational, 
logical argument against Christianity; nor have I ever seen 
or heard a rational, philosophic or logical argument in favor 
of any form of skepticism or infidelity. 

**Jesus Christ was, and is, a person; not a thing, not a 
doctrine, not a theory. Infidelity is not a person, not a thing, 
not a theory. There may be a theory of it, but it is not a 
theor}^ It is a state of mind, an intellectual or a moral im- 
becility. It is a spiritual jaundice, sometimes green and some- 
times black. They cannot be philosophically, logically, ra- 
tionally compared. They are neither logical nor literal con- 
trasts. The infidel is but the incarnation of a negative idea. 

109 



110 Debates That Made History 

He is absolutely but a mere negation. He stands to Chris- 
tianity as darkness stands to light. Is darkness anything? 
Is blindness anything but the loss of sight? Is unbelief any- 
thing but repudiation of evidence? One might as rationally 
load a cannon to fight against darkness as to dispatch a syl- 
logism against a chimera. 

^'Jesus Christ was a real person, and had personal, positive, 
attributes. He had a real and positive character, unique, 
original, transcendent. It v^as as fixed, as positive, as radiat- 
ing as the sun in heaven. The originality and unity of his 
character is all-sufficient in the eye of educated reason to 
claim for him a cordial welcome into our world, and to hail 
him as the supreme benefactor of our race. 

*'To my mind it has long been a moral demonstration, 
clear as the sun that no one could have drawn a character 
such as that of Jesus Christ from all the stores of human 
learning, from all the resources of human imagination. The 
simple character of Jesus Christ weighs more in the eyes of 
cultivated reason than all the miracles he ever wrought. No 
greater truth was ever uttered than these words *He that hath 
seen me hath seen the Father, also.' No mortal ever could 
have said so. The wisdom and science and learning of the 
world, compared with his, was and is, and evermore shall be, 
as a glimmering spark to a radiant star, as a glow worm of 
the twilight, in contrast with the splendors of a meridian 
sun. It is only in the dark we can admire a glow-worm. 
We can not see it when the sun shines. But we might as 
hopefully lecture to a blind man, on the philosophy of light, 
as address the mere sensualist, the visionary, or the dogmatic 
simpleton on the originality, unity, transparency, beauty and 
grandeur of the character of Jesus Christ. An animal man 
will not look, and, therefore, he cannot see the light; the 
true light which shines in the face of the Lord Jesus Christ. 
He affirms that he sees, but he sees not what he affirms. 



Campbell-Owen Debate Concluded 111 

"Now what has dreamy skepticism or presumptuous unbe- 
lief to offer as an apology for itself, in vindication of its posi- 
tion, or as a substitute for Christianity ? The light of nature, 
the light of reason, the dictates of conscience! What flimsy 
sophistry! Where is the light of nature found? And who 
in pagandom has eyes to see it! This light of reason, these 
dictates of conscience, where are the found? Show me, pro- 
duce for me one example of the power of this light of nature, 
this light of reason, these dictates of conscience! Show me 
this eye of reason with this light of nature, working faith in 
God; working out Christian civilization, refinement of man- 
ners, temperance, justice, public virtue and humanity; to say 
nothing of piety and the love and admiration of the purity 
of God, and I will lend a willing ear to such a demonstra- 
tion. But the annals of the world and the experience of the 
present generation afford no such spectacle. 

Our Debt to Cliristian Democracy 

"As I have said we are indebted for all the great improve- 
ments in society to the philosophy of Christians and not to 
the philosophy of skeptics. A free, just and equitable gov- 
ernment has always developed the powers of the human 
mind. Political, or civil liberty, is essential to the ex- 
pansion and development of human intellect. All history is 
appealed to in proof of this. Just in proportion as civil liberty 
has been enjoj^ed, have mankind in all ages, distinguished 
themselves by the vigor and expansion of their minds. Let 
any man contrast the ancient Greeks, who were free, with 
their contemporaries, the Persians who were under a despotic 
government, and he will see the influences of free institutions, 
in the genius, eloquence, and daring enterprise of the former 
compared with the latter. Should he ascribe the superiority 
to their being of a different race, or to the influence of climate, 
let him turn his attention to the Lacedaemonians and their 
helots or slaves. When the Messenians were two centuries 



112 Debates That Made History 

in slavery, one Lacedaemonian possessed the mental vigor and 
valor of half a score of them. But only draw the contrast 
(in 1829) which our country presents and mark the differ- 
ence between the citizen and the slave. The employment of 
civil liberty is shown from reason and experience, from the 
faithful page of history, to give a new impetus to all the 
faculties of man. To this liberty, then, we are constrained 
to ascribe the great improvements in all the arts of civilized 
and social life. But to see the connection between this liberty 
and these free institutions, and Christianity, we have only to 
ask, *To whom are we most indebted for improvements in 
governments?' The reformation from popery gave the first 
shock to the despotism of Europe. The labors of the reform- 
ers, and the more recent labors of Milton the poet, and Locke, 
the philosopher, have done more to create the free institutions 
of Europe and America, than the labors of all the skeptics 
from Celsus to my friend Mr. Owen. 

The Future Life, the Real Issue 

^'But we cannot sit down without admonishing you to bear 
constantly in mind the inconceivable and ineffable importance 
attached to the investigation. It is not the ordinary affairs of 
this life, the fleeting and transitory concerns of today or to- 
morrow ; it is not whether we shall live all freemen, or die all 
slaves; it is not the momentary affairs of empire, or the evan- 
escent charms of dominion — Nay, indeed, all these are but 
the toys of childhood, the sportive excursions of youthful 
fancy, contrasted with the questions: What is man? Whence 
came he? Whither does he go? Is he a mortal or an im- 
mortal being? Is he doomed to spring up like the grass, 
bloom like a flower, drop his seed into the earth, and die for- 
ever? Is there no object of future hope? No God, no 
heaven, no exalted society to be known or enjoyed? Are all 
the great and illustrious men and women, who have lived 
before we were born, wasted and gone forever? After a few 
short days are fled, when the enjoyments and toils of life are 



Campbell-Owen Debate Concluded 113 

over; when our relish for social enjoyment, and our desires 
for returning to the fountain of life are most acute? Must 
we hang our heads and close our eyes in the desolating and 
appalling prospect of never opening them again, of ever tast- 
ing the sweets for which a state of discipline and trial have 
so well fitted us ? These are the awful and sublime merits of 
the question at issue. It is not what we shall eat, nor what 
we shall drink, unless we shall be proved to be mere animals; 
but it is, shall we live or die forever? It is beautifully ex- 
pressed by a Christian poet. 

Shall Spring ever visit the mouldering urn? 
Shall day ever dawn on the night of the grave? 

The Triumphs of Skepticism 

"When skepticism triumphs in any heart, the hope of im- 
mortality is banished. It crowns the tyrant Death forever 
on his throne, and seals the conquests of the grave over the 
whole human race. It wraps the tomb in eternal darkness, 
and suffers not one particle of the remains of the great, the 
wise, and the good of all ages, to see the light of eternity; 
but consigns, by an irreversible doom, all that was admired, 
loved and revered in man, to perpetual annihilation. It 
identifies human existence with the vilest reptile, and levels 
man to the grade of the meanest weed, the utility of which is 
yet undiscovered. Man's origin and his destiny are to its 
ken alike fortuitous, unimportant and uninteresting. Having 
robbed him of everything which could make him dear to him- 
self and proud of his existence, it murders all his hopes of 
future being and future bliss. It cuts the cable and casts 
away the golden anchor ; it sets man adrift on the mighty, un- 
fathomable and unexplored ocean of uncertainty to become 
the sport of wind and waves, of animal passion and appetite; 
until, at last, in some tremendous gust, 'he sinks to everlast- 
ing ruin?' Say then, proud reasoner, of what utility is your 
philosophy? What your boast? 



114 Debates That Made History 

"You boast that you have made man ignorant of his origin 
and a stranger to himself. You boast that you have deprived 
him of any real superiority over the bee, the bat or the beaver ; 
that you have divested him of the highest inducements to a 
virtuous life, by taking away the knowledge of God and the 
hope of heaven. You boast that you have made death tri- 
umphant and not only over the body; but the intellectual 
dignity of man and that you have buried his soul and body 
in the grave of an eternal sleep, never to see the light of life 
again! O skepticism! is this thy philosophy — is this thy 
boasted victory over the Bible? And for this extinguishment 
ot light and life eternal, what dost thou teach and what be- 
stow? Thou teachest us to live according to our appetites, 
and dost promise us that in thy Millennium man shall live 
in a paradise of colonies, almost as industrious, as independent 
and as social as the bees. Well then dost thou preach with 
zeal and exert thy energies; for thy heaven is worthy of thy 
efforts and the purity of thy life is justly adapted to the high 
hopes of eternal annihilation. 

Closing Paragraph and Pinal Scene 

"Before we dismiss this assembly, I beg leave to express 
m^y sensibility, my admiration of the marked and courteous 
attention which has been paid by this community to this dis- 
cussion. I must again repeat that I have never seen any as- 
sembly convened, upon any occasion, which has all through 
exhibited the same good order, the same complaisant behavior, 
and the same unremitted attention. I feel indebted to, and 
will ever feel a high respect for the citizens of this city, for 
the favorable circumstances which they have created for this 
debate, and especially to the gentlemen, who have so politely 
and patiently presided over this meeting. 

"But I should be wanting to you, my friends, and the 
cause which I plead, if I should dismiss you without making 
tc you a very important proposition. You know that every 
encomium that has been pronounced upon your exemplary 



Campbell-Owen Debate Concluded 115 

behavior, will go with the report of this discussion. You will 
remember, too, that many indignities have been offered to 
your faith, to your religion, and that these reproaches and 
indignities have been only heard with pity and not marked 
with the least resentment on your part. Now I must tell 
you that a problem will arise in the minds of those living 
five hundred or a thousand miles distant, who may read this 
discussion. Whether it was owing to a perfect apathy or in- 
difference on your part, as to any interest you felt in the 
Christian religion, that you bore all these insults zuithout 
seeming to hear the?n. In fine, the question will be, whether 
it was owing to the stoical indifference of fatalism, to the 
prevalence of infidelity; or to the meekness and forbearance 
which Christianity teaches, that you bore all these indignities 
without a single expression of disgust. Now I desire no more 
than that this good and Christianlike deportment may be 
credited to the proper account. If it be owing to your con- 
currence in sentiment with Mr. Owen, let skepticism have 
the honor of it. But, if owing to your belief in or regard for 
the Christian religion, let the Christian religion have the 
honor of it. These things premised, my proposition is, that 
all the persons in this assembly who believe in the Christian 
religion, or who feel so much interest in it, as to wish to see 
it pervade the world, will please to signify it by standing up," 
(An almost universal rising up.) 

Here Mr. Campbell said, "You will have the goodness to 
be seated. Now I would further propose that all persons 
doubtful of the truth of the Christian religion, or who do not 
believe it, and who are not friendly to its spread and preva- 
lence over the world, will please signify it by rising," (Three 
arise.) 

As a result of the oral and printed debate thousands have 
been reclaimed from their skepticism, and thousands that 
needed encouragement and corroboration have been confirmed. 



CHAPTER XI 

THE CAMPBELL-PURCELL DEBATE ON THE 
ROMAN CATHOLIC RELIGION 

Held in the Sycamore Street Meeting House, Cincinnati, 
Ohio, from the I3th to 2lst of January, 1837. 



PROPOSITION I. 

The Roman Catholic Institution, sometimes called 
the ^'Holy, Apostolic, Catholic, Church," is not now, nor 
was she ever, catholic, apostolic, or holy; but is a 
sect in the fair import of that word, older than any 
other sect now existing, not the ^'Mother and Mistress 
of all Churches," but an apostacy from the only true, 
holy, apostolic, and catholic church of Christ. 

Mr, Campbell affirms. 
Bishop Pur cell denies. 



CHAPTER XI 

THE CAMPBELL-PURCELL DEBATE ON THE ROMAN 
CATHOLIC RELIGION 

EIGHT years after Mr. Campbell had overthrown, in 
his debate with Robert Owen, agnostic materialism, and 
Bolshevik infidelity, of French revolutionary origin, in 
the City of Cincinnati, he w^as called upon by its citizens to 
return in the capacity of a warrior to meet another aggressive 
and threatening foe to American civilization and the Chris- 
tian religion. These good citizens were apprehensive that 
Roman politico-ecclesiasticism was a more serious foe to our 
liberties and the spiritual progress of our people, than any 
conceivable number of social systems and cities of mental 
independence. 

The events leading up to this discussion, on the Roman 
Catholic Religion, furnished obvious pointers in that direc- 
tion. A college of teachers had been organized in the city, 
composed of educators and teachers of all grades and classes. 
The public sessions of this association were devoted to lec- 
tures on education and discussions on school subjects, and 
educational problems in general. On Oct. 3, 1836, a Dr. 
Wilson gave an introductory lecture in which he recom- 
mended the Bible as a universal school book. Bishop Purcell, 
who had been a teacher before he became a bishop, was pres- 
ent, and took emphatic exception to the suggested introduction 
of the Bible into the common school system of the country. 
Alexander Campbell who had come to the city to deliver 
one of the lectures of the course, was also present and was 
taken by surprise at the boldness of Purcell in advocating 
the expulsion of the Holy Scriptures from the public schools. 

Upon the delivery of Mr. Campbell's lecture the next 
evening on ^^Moral Culture," in which he connected the 

119 



120 Debates That Made History 

rapid march of modern improvements with the spirit of inquiry 
produced by the Protestant Reformation, Bishop Purcell took 
strong exception to this position, openly affirming that "The 
Protestant Reformation had been the cause of all the con- 
tention and infidelity in the world/' Observations of this 
kind were palpably out of order in a convention where re- 
ligious discussion was not allowed. Mr. Campbell at once 
informed the Bishop of his readiness to meet him in a public 
investigation of the questions raised by his criticism, at a 
proper time and place, but in the college he could not defend 
his assertion, except in its relation to education. Bishop 
Purcell did not then accede to the proposition to debate the 
point at issue, but declared himself in favor of free discussion ; 
saying that his word was the word of God. Mr. Campbell 
then announced that he would deal with the subject the 
following Monday evening in the Sycamore Street Christian 
Church. 

Bishop Purcell was present when the time came — strange 
unprecedented conduct for a representative of papal in- 
fallibility — no imitators since — didn't work well enough to 
establish a precedent — Mr. Campbell invited him to reply, 
and offered to divide time with him in further discussion. 
He declined, but requested an adjournment till the next eve- 
ning, on which occasion, he spent most of his time in a fierce 
tirade against Martin Luther and the Reformation. At the 
close he declined further debate. The next evening Mr. 
Campbell addressed an overwhelming audience in Wesley 
Church on the issues involved and gave notice of his purpose 
not to prosecute the matter any further, summing up the 
points treated in six propositions, which he declared himself 
able at any time to sustain. The next day the following com- 
munication was put into his hands: 

To the Rev. Mr. Campbell: Cincinnati, Ohio, Oct. 13. 1836. 

The undersigned citizens of Cincinnati having listened, with 
great pleasure, to your exposure and illustrations of the absurd 
claims and usages of the Roman Catholic church, would respectfully 
and earnestly request you to proceed immediately to establish, be- 



The Campbell-Purcell Debate 121 

fore this community, the six propositions announced at the close of 
your lecture last evening. This request is made under the convic- 
tion that the present state of feeling in this city, and the critical 
state of the country with reference to Romanism, demand this, and 
will fully justify such a course, and also with the expectation that 
it may result in much good to the cause of Protestantism in the 
West 

This letter, we are informed, was signed by a large numbei 
of the most respectable citizens and the following P. S. was 
added : 

One half of the city could be obtained would time permit. 
Fearing your hasty departure induces the above persons to hand 
it in without delay. 

Mr. Campbell, according to his biographer, Dr. Richardson, 
after giving a brief statement of the circumstances, which 
had led to the introduction of the subject, and restating his 
propositions, frankly consented to sustain them publicly against 
Bishop Purcell, or any of the Catholic priesthood, stipulating 
only, that in order to give proper publicity to the matter and 
to afford time to fulfill his existing engagements, the meeting 
should be postponed till about the beginning of the New Year, 
when he would, either in a discussion or in public lectures, 
endeavor to maintain the propositions he had submitted. 
Bishop Purcell having subsequently consented to meet Mr. 
Campbell, the propositions were arranged as follows: 

1. The Roman Catholic institution, sometimes called the Holy 
Apostolic Church, is not now nor was she ever Catholic, apostolic 
or holy; but is a sect in the fair import of that word, older than 
any other sect now existing; not the "mother and mistress of all 
churches," but an apostasy from the only true apostolic and Catholic 
church of Christ. 

2. Her notion of apostolic succession is without any foundation 
in the Bible, in reason or in fact; an imposition of the most in- 
jurious consequences built upon unscriptural and anti-scriptural 
traditions, resting wholly upon the opinions of interested and fallible 
men. 

3. She is not uniform in her faith nor united in her numbers but 
mutable and fallible as any other sect of philosophy or religion — 
Jewish, Turkish, or Christian — a confederation of sects under a po- 
litico-ecclesiastic head. 



122 Debates That Made History 

4. She is the "Babylon" of John, the "Man of Sin" of Paul, and 
the "Empire of the Youngest Horn" of Daniel's sea monster. 

5. Her notions of purgatory, indulgences, auricular confession, re- 
mission of sins, transubstantiation, supererogation, etc., essential ele- 
ments of her system, are immoral in their tendency and injurious to 
the well being of society, religious and political. 

6. Notwithstanding her pretentions to have given us the Bible 
and faith in it, we are perfectly independent of her for our knowl- 
edge of that book and its evidences of a divine original. 

7. The Roman Catholic religion, if infallible and unsusceptible 
of reformation, as alleged, is essentially anti-American being op- 
posed to the genius of all free institutions and positively subversive 
ot them, opposing the general reading of the Scriptures and the 
diffusion of useful knowledge among the whole community, so es- 
sential to liberty and the permanency of good government. 

Before we enter upon a detailed analysis and interpretation 
of the discussion of these propositions, a few lines must be 
written as to the present day issues between these opposing 
outgrowths of original Christianity. 

In the first place, and as a matter of fact, Romanism is 
ecclesiasticism — an ecclesiastical and hierarchical organization, 
finely articulated and carried to its highest terms — it worships 
an institutional God. As a system it interprets religion in 
terms of ecclesiastical and sacerdotal machinery, and not in 
terms of New Testament Christianity. 

Protestantism, on the other hand, is dogmatism, it sub- 
stitutes a theological creed for an institutional system. It 
exchanged an infallible church for an infallible book and got 
the better of the bargain, but soon found, by experience, that 
an intellectual creed, founded on an intellectual interpretation 
of the Bible, had less power to unify and no more power to 
save and make character than the sacraments and ceremonies 
of the church. Over against these two considerations Chris- 
tianity is not ecclesiasticism, and is not dogmatism ; it is ideal- 
isTUj which finds its center of unity and power in the personal- 
ity of Jesus, the Christ, who was the supreme historic incarna- 
tion of the ideal, the realization of which in experience and 
life makes men Christian and religion Christianity. 



CHAPTER XII 

ORIGIN OF THE DEBATE, WITH APPRAISE- 
MENT 

Discussion of the First of the Purcell Propositions. Rome 
Sectarian, like the Rest of Us — Only More So. 



I stand here as the defender of Protestantism, and 
not as the assailant of Catholicism. * * * Permit 
me here to say, most emphatically, that I have not the 
slightest disposition to use terms of opprobrium in 
speaking of his church; or of the worthy gentleman 
who opposes me in this debate. 

— Alexander Campbell. 

If it can be proved that the Catholic church had not 
these characteristics, we admit she is not the church of 
Christ. I shall go to trial on this point If she has 
ever ceased to teach the whole doctrine of Christ, to 
diflFuse over all nations, the true Christian precepts, or 
if she has not had a larger body of professors, than 
any of the sects, that separated in every successive age 
from her communion, then will I yield the question. 

— Bishop PurcelL 



CHAPTER XII 
ORIGIN OF THE DEBATE, WITH APPRAISEMENT 

THE late Hugh Price Hughes declared, a generation ago, 
that there were three Catholicisms and three correspond- 
ing Catholic groups or parties in England; Roman Cath- 
olic, Anglican Catholic, and Christian Catholic. Each one of 
these groups has a center of unity peculiar to itself. Roman 
Catholicism centers in the pope and in the pope alone. Angli- 
can Catholicism has its focus in the crown of the empire, and 
in the crown alone. Christian Catholicism has its focalizing 
center of gravity and unity in Christ, and in Christ alone. 

The church, and the church alone is the religion of Catho- 
lics, Anglican and Roman. The Bible and the Bible alone the 
religion of Protestants. Christ and Christ alone the religion 
of Christians. Catholics, so called, accept Christ but they 
put the church in front of him ; they accept the Bible but they 
bury it under the church. Protestants accept Christ and then 
lose him in the book that reveals him. They accept the Bible, 
and believe it to be the inspired word of God and then pro- 
ceed to interpret it, not in terms of personal idealism and 
practical service, but in terms of dogmatic theology and a 
hide bound intellectual creed. 

Christian Catholicism belongs to the church and gives it 
all needful reverence and appreciation, as one of God's great 
instruments in world redemption; it receives and loves the 
Bible as another of God's great and most vital agencies for 
enlightenment, edification, and salvation; and, as taught by 
church and Bible, it puts supreme accent on the ideals of 
personality and character, beginning with Jesus Christ and 
ending with the day of judgment. The law of progressive 
development and the process of the suns have not and will 
not cease their operations till we have a new Protestantism 

125 



126 Debates That Made History 

which will not be Protestantism at all, in the old negative 
acception of the term, but a new and greater Christianity, 
that will reinstall Jesus, our Divine Lord, in his old place of 
dominion as the symbol, center and basis of unity, glory and 
catholicity. 

At the time of this debate, when an infallible book was 
to measure arms with the corrupt and arrogant claims of an 
infallible church, a movement had already commenced in the 
heart of the Campbell reformation to put the human life of 
God, the divine man, the infallible person in the place of first 
honor and power. This Christological interpretation of the 
faith is credited to Walter Scott and subsequently, in its 
evolution and application, to Isaac Errett and J. H. Garrison, 
the two great editors of the movement. The Disciple con- 
tingent of our day, as a whole, has not fully comprehended 
the magnitude and bearings of this truth ; but its prophetic and 
forward looking men, of whom there are many, are in the 
school house, their books are open, the light is shining through 
the window, the teacher has arrived and the issue, I am sure, is 
not doubtful. 

And, still more wonderful to relate, the ponderous and un- 
changing Catholicisms are beginning to move. A recent dis- 
tinguished representative of the Anglican Catholic communion 
declared : "A monopoly which claims a sole validity in sacra- 
mental grace, will be resisted unto death, by all who believe 
in the absolute freedom of the grace of God" — a dead 
surrender to the Christian Catholics of the British Empire. 
In the latest utterances of the Roman pontiff, his holiness de- 
clares: *'Man precedes the state.*' Well, well, are you not 
aware, old man of the Vatican, that that kind of talk is ele- 
gant democracy, but rotten autocracy, in which line of things 
you are the chief of sinners? Why didn't you whisper that 
to the Kaiser and the Emperor before they unchained the 
dogs of war and deluged the world in blood ? Have you, too, 
been sipping the deadly potion of Americanism and primitive 
Christianity? The old popes, who exercised temporal domin- 



Origin of the Debate j with Appraisement 127 

ion in the good old days of the holy Roman Empire, would 
turn over in their graves at such talk as that. 

But let us push back the car of time for nearly a century 
and drop off at Cincinnati station long enough to witness the 
great historic struggle between theological giants of 1837, on 
the old lines of the post-reformation doctrine of an inerrant 
book, and the dark age assumption and delusion of an in- 
fallible church; and see what kind of a contribution it made 
to the situation of 1920 as I have just described it. 

1. The Roman Catholic institution sometimes called the Holy 
Apostolic Church, is not now, nor was she ever catholic, apostolic, or 
holy; but is a sect in the fair import of that word, older than any 
other sect now existing; not the "mother and mistress of all 
churches,'* but an apostacy from the only true, apostolic, and catholic 
church of Christ. - 

A drastic proposition for two Irishmen to discuss — 
two masters of ''logomachy'' from the inflammatorjT- and 
disputatious Emerald Isle! Alexander Campbell was of 
Scotch Irish extraction from combative and progressive North 
of Ireland. Bishop Purcell emanated from the bog trot- 
ting and superstitious south. It may be ''a long way'' from 
London to ''Tipperary," but it is much farther, in terms of 
ecclesiastical geography, from Belfast to Cork ! A wide space 
and stretch of territory in the "no man's land" between the 
entrenched host of Orange Protestantism of the north, and 
the enditched armies of Romanism in the bog lands of the 
south; so much space indeed, that the Gettysburg of this un- 
civil war had to be transferred to the new world, where 
bigotry and mobocracy did not operate automatically, to 
break up all decent attempts at public discussion. 

We have already gone far enough in this ''battle of the 
giants," to discover that Purcell was far removed from the 
ordinary type of Roman Catholic official. And he had in- 1 
dividuality and a sense of freedom, sufficiently developed, to 
announce his belief in free discussion, and courage enough to 
show his faith by his works, by actually engaging in it. In 



128 Debates That Made History 

the four hundred years of Protestant history, it has not found 
another priest of his grit and calibre. There has been but 
one debate on the Roman Catholic religion. The priestly 
method of meeting an opponent from Martin Luther on, has 
been to put the enginery of persecution in motion against him, 
or to stir up a mob to deal with him by **direct action.'* The 
Cincinnati Bishop has had no polemic successors, and no dis- 
ciples nor imitators. 

In personality, culture, scholarship, argumentative ingenu- 
ity, and controversial ability, the Catholic bishop is the great- 
est of Mr. Campbell's opponents. He was weak in logic, 
but powerful in rhetoric. He was strong in history, and in 
the idealization of history, when it suited his purpose but, 
powerful weak in the interpretation of history. He knew 
little of the Bible and misinterpreted the little he knew. For 
the first three or four days he was the equal of Robert Owen 
in politeness and courtesy; after that he wabbled and fell 
into the ditch of prejudicial appeal and personalities, made 
smooth by Mr. Campbell's two seceder Presbyterian oppo- 
nents. The consciousness, perhaps, that he was not winning 
his fight, might have had something to do with the Bishop's 
loss of the suavity and poise that characterized him in the 
first days of the discussion. 

In the opening speeches there is nothing of particular human 
interest, except that both speakers were called to order by the 
chairman. Mr. Campbell had branched out in the explana- 
tion of certain preliminaries, which the chairman did not 
think germane to the points at issue. At about the same 
point in his opening address, the bishop did the same thing, 
in pretty much the same way, for which he was called down 
b) the chair. Smiling, he looked around at Mr. Campbell 
?nd said, *'Now we are even." This put every body at their 
ease and the audience in a good humor, a good beginning for 
the first day's debate. 

Mr. Campbell's first affirmative required him to furnish 
proof to make good the assertion that Roman Catholics were 



Origin of the Debate j with Appraisement 129 

sectarians, and Romanism, in its institutional aspects, was 
sectarianism. A very easy proposition to establish, one would 
imagine. Any man with half an eye can see that there are 
three outstanding and differentiating marks of sectarianism, 
that can only be hidden from view by self-blindness, superin- 
duced by ignorance and prejudice; a sectarian name, a sectarian 
creed, and a sectarian spirit. Rome has all three of these 
identifying marks of the sectarian beast, writ large, 

Mr. Campbell's first argument was based on the name 
Roman Catholic. Roman is a descriptive adjective, modify- 
ing or qualif5ang the noun catholic. The adjective Roman 
is sectional and limited, the noun Catholic is universal and 
unlimited, and that gives us a sectional universal, a particular 
general, a limited unlimited, a national international, a county 
or a cabbage patch, in terms of world wide extension — How 
does that sound? Like a contradiction in terms, doesn't it? 
If the Roman church is Roman it is not Catholic, and if it 
is Catholic, it is not Roman. Purcell sought to evade this 
failure to subtend analogies, by saying that Roman, as a desig- 
nating term, is not used with any reference to its sectional 
or geographical limitations, but only with reference to its 
suitability, as a name for an institution that has its center 
and place of power in the capitol city of the great Roman 
Empire. So the name was arbitrarily expanded to fit the 
larger term catholic, or was adopted as a mere handle without 
any particular significance. And this is not the worst. It 
was bad enough to universalize a local term, but it was much 
worse to localize a universal term. Not only did Romanism 
monkey with the name of the church by universalizing a 
sectional adjective, but still more sinfully did it monkey and 
manipulate by sectionalizing the universal noun. 

In other words, it unblushingly sectarianizes the universal 
term catholic, by applying the name of the whole to a sec- 
tion, or part of the whole. To this bit of egoistic sectarian 
insanity there is one historic parallel in politics and geography. 
Sir Henry Parks, prime minister of New South Wales, in the 



130 Debates That Made History 

old colonial days of Australia, coolly proposed, in a national- 
ization scheme of his, to change the name of New South 
Wales, one of the five colonies to Australia, the catholic, or 
universal name of the five states taken together! One can 
easily imagine what the other four colonies would have to 
say to a* ridiculous proposition of that kind. Alas, that only 
institutions bearing the name of Jesus Christ, and claiming 
to have been founded by him, can be guilty of such bug house 
performances, such transparencies of bigotry and blindness. 
But this is not the worst in the sectarian count against Roman- 
ism. Its unmistakable object and purpose in choosing the 
name Roman, was to separate, mark off, and distinguish it- 
self from the Greek communion, from which it was a split, 
schism, sect, or section. Latin Christianity, the equivalent 
of Roman popery separated itself from the Greek church in 
a preposterous row over two letters in a Greek word, and 
then proceeded to choose a peculiar identifying appellation, 
an exclusive denominational title, after the characteristic style 
of every other sect ever organized on the planet. If the truth 
was ever told in human words, Alexander Campbell told it, 
when he affirmed that the Roman Catholic institution was a 
sect in the fair import of that word, an old sect it is true, and 
a big one, but nevertheless a sect, manifest from the begin- 
ning, by its sectarian name. 

The second ''peculiaristic" of a genuine sect, is as a matter 
of course, a sectarian creed or theology, a dogmatic formula- 
tion as sectarian as the name that covers it. Rome, by the 
help of Greek philosophy, Roman law and Oriental mysticism, 
constructed a metaphysical creed on the basis of the Athana- 
sian formula, the most senseless document that ever effluviated 
from an addled human brain. How is one to reconcile 
an ^^incomprehensible'* tritheism (three Gods) in one breath 
with an equally ^'incomprehensible" unitarianism (one God), 
in the next, and then be damned for not believing both of 
them at the same time? Then what about the idealization of 
tradition as a basis of historic religion because it cannot find 
a fulcrum strong enough, in the Bible, for its sectarian lever 



Origin of the Debate, with Appraisement 131 

to rest on? The Schism and sect peculiarities of Romanism 
are just as numerous and glaring, and as menacingly out- 
standing as in any of the provincial cults and sects of Protes- 
tantism; more, indeed, than any, unless it be our Roman 
Catholic high church Protestants, the Baptists of the south 
and west of this country, who take the same attitude to all 
unity problems, as his Holiness the Pope, because they share 
his conception of the church and its functions. 

Rome, like the evangelical sects of Christendom, is ortho- 
dox and Catholic on many of the fundamental doctrines of 
Christianity, but these are overlaid and underlaid and shot 
through, up and down, with ecclesiastical and theological 
peculiarities, not catholic in any allowable connotation of the 
term. The papal administration of church order is not cath- 
olic. It was borrowed from the pagan Roman Empire and 
not from any sect of religion. Five of her seven sacraments 
are not catholic; the other two, baptism and the Lord^s Supper, 
having, in fact, the appearance of catholicity, have been so 
changed, corrupted and perverted that they are not the bap- 
tism and holy communion of the New Testament at all, but 
the sectarian substitutes and priestly inventions of an apostate 
religion. Her priesthood is an uncatholic, unspiritual, un- 
ethical compound of Judaism and paganism with only a slight 
homeopathetic tincture of Christianity mixed up in the dose. 
It came originally through Moses, from Egypt and Semite 
heathenism and is subversive, absolutely of the catholic priest- 
hood of all believers so plainly and indisputably taught in the 
New Testament. A Romish priest may ^^function service- 
ably," as the representative of an ancient sect, in front of 
Jewish and pagan altars, but there is no place for him in the 
religion of the New Testament; absolutely none. He is an 
interloper and a nuisance on the holy ground of New Testa- 
ment Christianity. Sacerdotalism was as foreign to the words 
of Christ and the apostles and the New Testament church, as 
the metaphysical theories of so-called Christian Science, or 
the wild and woolly correspondence doctrines of Immanuel 
Swedenborg. It is a fundamental right of the human soul 



132 Debates That Made History 

to approach God on a straight open line of access to his 
presence, without human intermediaries, to mumble and block 
the way. It has been known for a long time, to all intelligent 
people, and will be better known to us before we get through 
with this debate, that there can be no cessation of the war, 
and no reconciliation between a sacerdotal and a spiritual 
interpretation of the Word of God, until one of them makes 
a *'U. S. Grant*^ surrender to the other. The papal system 
and the creed on which it was founded have been built into 
a sacerdotal wall, encircling an arrogant and supercillious 
hierarchy with the claim of exclusive divine authority to ad- 
minister the sacraments and sacramental grace, and all the 
rest of it. 

The bigotry of Romanism, which is the distilled essence of 
the sectarian spirit, is too unhidable, unescapable and blazingly 
apparent to need proof. The partisan spirit of intolerance, 
hate, and hostility, bigotry, prejudice, and persecution has al- 
ways characterized the priest and priestly institutions, as op- 
posed to the prophet and prophetic ideals. Man is a born 
partisan anyway and when he is brought up in a sectarian 
environment, belongs to an infallible church, receives his spir- 
itual pabulum from an inerrant creed, is fed with a spoon in 
the hands of an immaculate priest; is it any wonder that he 
should come to look with ill-concealed repugnance upon his 
neighbor who has the hardihood to differ from him, and his 
holy mother church; and that Red Rods, Torguemadas, and 
Hildebrands should come about, who believe they are serving 
God when they torture or kill the body of a heretic in the in- 
terest of the salvation of his immortal soul? 

All of the Catholicisms, Roman, Greek, and Anglican, are 
anti-catholic and anti-Christian in the sect spirit of exclu- 
siveness, narrowness, and selfishness, that constitutes, always 
and everywhere, the essential ingredients of their composition. 

There are some big battles looming just ahead of us in this 
debate, in the fields of history, tradition and biblical interpre- 
tation which will make us sit up and take notice. 



CHAPTER XIII 

THE CAMPBELL-PURCELL DEBATE: MORALS 
AND DOCTRINE 

Rome's Unholiness and Shocking Sinfulness Proves Her More 
Apostatic than Apostolic. 



Indeed, I know not why the spirit of God should be 
promised through such a wretched and polluted chan- 
nel as the popes of Rome, rather than to operate 
from heaven in all its holy influences upon those, who 
by its appointment, are chosen and ordained by prayer, 
fastings, and imposition of hands, as deacons or bish- 
ops of the Christian congregations. We lose nothing 
then, in abandoning the leaky and sinking ship of pon- 
tifical authority in the Roman Catholic church. 

— Alexander Campbell. 

Nothing, my friends, gives me more faith in the 
genuineness and truth of our holy religion, than when 
in reviewing the history of these disgraceful enormities, 
I find the church, in the very midst of scandal, enough 
to blacken and overthrow any earthly institution, still 
supported and upheld by the almighty hand of God. 
A church that has stood through all that the gentleman 
has laid to the charge of the merely mortal men who 
have presided for a season over its destinies. A few 
of them erred in morals, but none of them in faith ; 
sound doctrine and sound morals were seen and ad- 
mired, during these sad eclipses, and infidel nations 
were, during that passing obscurity in Rome rejoicing 
in the beams of the orient sun of justice, heralded by 
Catholic missionaries. Let this be borne in mind when 
my learned opponent undertakes to prove that the pope 
is the sea-serpent! And let my Protestant friends un- 
derstand that the Roman Catholics detest immorality 
as much as they can, wherever it may be found ; and 
most of all, where superior virtue was required by 
exalted station. We too had labored for a reformation, 
not of God's truth, for it needed none, but of men's 
morals which are always liable to corruption. 

— Bishop PurcelL 



CHAPTER XIII 

THE CAMPBELL-PURCELL DEBATE: MORALS AND 
DOCTRINE 

THE demonstration of Rome's sectarianism — a sectarian- 
ism of the most odious and repugnant type — in the second 
half of Mr. Campbell's proposition required him to probe 
to the heart of the difficulty, and to find the seat of the trouble 
in a moral and spiritual lapse from the essential norm and 
fact of New Testament Christianity. The baptism of the 
church, in the blood stained waters of politics and worldliness 
and Satan's most approved brand of selfishness, made for an 
ethical rottenness, which made Romanism or something like 
it, inevitable. 

But, before we reach some striking illustrations of the kind 
of holiness Rome believed in, and practiced, we must allow 
Mr. Campbell to sum up the historic argument against Rome 
as a sect and mother of sects. It will be a damaging abbre- 
viation I know, but all our space will allow is a condensed 
statement of facts: 

1. The church of Christ was not originally known by the name 
Catholic. 

2. The Roman sect was not the church of the first six centuries. 

3. The second fact is demonstrated by a third. She had no Pope 
nor supreme head for full six hundred years after Christ. 

4. The seven historic councils of the first six centuries were all 
Greek, not one of them Latin. 

5. All ancient ecclesiastical historians were Greeks. Such as 
Eusebius, Socrates, Scholasticus, Evagrius, Sogomon, Theodoret. 

6. The most ancient and primitive church fathers and theologians 
were Greeks. 

7. In these seven church councils, before the split with Rome, 
there were 1486 Grecian bishops and only 26 Roman bishops pres- 

135 



136 Debates That Made History 

ent. They were called by Greek emperors held in Greek cities and 
employed in the solution of Greek problems. 

8. The leading ecclesiastic terms of all the ancient offices, cus- 
toms and controversies, almost the entire theological and technical 
vocabulary of the Latin church are Greek. For example, "Pope,'* 
"Patriarch," "Synod," "Ecclesiastic," "Schism," "Schismatic, "Her- 
esy," "Heretic," "Catechumen," "Hierarchy," "Church," "Chrism," 
"Exorcism," "Diocess," "Presbytery," "Trinity," "Mystery," "Mystic,'' 
"Catholic," "Canon," and so on. Almost the entire ecclesiastical 
and theological terminology of Rome was borrowed from the Greeks. 
Doesn't this one fact, to say nothing of the other seven, fully prove 
priority and seniority of the Greek church, as it does that of the 
Greek language over the Latin? It is then a clean cut fact of his- 
tory that the Greek church was the mother and the Latin church 
the daughter and that the Latins split from the Greeks and made 
the first great historic rent, or schism, or sect of Christendom? If 
this is not so, we must adopt a new rule of history and logic, and 
say that the mother gets her language from the daughter and that 
the tail does actually wag the dog. 

What did Purcell have to say in reply to all these crushing 
facts, what effort did he make to parry these knock out blows ? 
Well, he abused the Greeks in the first place. He declared 
that the whole Hellenistic fraternity, philosophic, discursive, 
speculative, imaginative, were restless and reckless and rotten 
and the originators and purveyors of all the heterodoxies and 
heresies, from the beginning; that the brave Romans (26 of 
them to 1486 Greeks) went over into Greek territory to 
settle Greek disputes; that the Romans were dominant, as 
shown by the fact that one Roman Bishop presided over one 
of the seven councils. 

Mr. Campbell promptly reminded him that this last asser- 
tion was historically of doubtful disputation and asked for the 
proof on which it was supposed to rest. No proof was given 
because none existed, and so the brainy Greeks, heretics all, as 
brainy people usually are, were left in possession of the field. 
Mr. Campbell exploded the Bishop's logic by an ilustration: 

What would the gentleman prove by the fact if it be a fact, that 
a Roman bishop presided over one of these councils? That, there- 
fore, they were Roman councils? How would such logic pass 



Morals and Doctrine 137 

with us with regard to the house of representatives? His argument 
runs thus: Mr. Henry Clay was once Speaker of that House. Mr. 
Clay is from Kentucky, therefore, the House of Representatives 
were all Kentuckians! This would be exactly the pith of the logic 
we have heard. 

When he came to the last part of his proposition, **She is 
not holy,'* wishing with characteristic courtesy and kindness 
to handle, as tenderly as he could, the susceptibilities of his 
Roman Catholic auditors and fellow-citizens he said: 

I am impelled by a sense of duty, and not by any unkind feelings 
toward such of my fellow citizens as belong to that communion to 
attempt to prove that the church of Rome is not holy. I would not, 
heedlessly nor needlessly, offend against the feelings of an Indian, 
a Hindoo, or a pagan in his sincere devotions, how absurd soever 
they might be. Much less would I wound any one who professes 
the Christian religion under any form; but in serving my contempo- 
raries, in redeeming my pledge, it has become necessary to investi- 
gate the grand pretentions of this fraternity, that exclusively arro- 
gates to itself the title of holy. 

Mr. Campbell did not take up, at this point, the vices 
of the clergy and the shocking morals of the popes, ad- 
mitted and described in detail by cardinals Barronius 
and Bellarmine, and not denied by Bishop Purcell; nor 
did he mention the persecuting ferocities and abominable 
cruelties perpetrated through the centuries, by the holy church. 
He quoted a single text, from the last named of the two car- 
dinals, which, unblushingly, avows a doctrine that must, for- 
ever, make the Roman Catholic church anti-Christian and un- 
holy. It is expressed in these unforgettable words: "Wicked 
men, infidels and reprobates, remaining in the public profes- 
sion of the Romanish church, are true members of the body of 
Christ." 

The comment of history on this authoritative utterance of 
doctrine is that the holy church, in the most thoroughgoing 
manner lived up, or down rather, to its creed. Visit Roman 
Catholic countries, Spain, Portugal, Austria, Italy, South of 
Ireland, Mexico, and South America, and cities, in Protestant 
countries, dominated by the Roman Catholic religion; note 



138 Debates That Made History 

the radical differences between types of civilization in the 
Catholic and Protestant cantons of Switzerland, as Charles 
Dickens did, and see in what loving concord and sweet un- 
cloyed, harmony, doctrine, and practice, faith and morals, 
march hand in hand, together in the holy mother church ; de- 
pending on the Confessional and the fires of purgatory to 
square accounts in the end! 

One of the church's favorite methods of propagating its 
peculiar conception of holiness is to bury the New Testament 
in the tomb of a dead language, Jerome's Latin Vulgate, 
There is not a vernacular New Testament in existence, by 
the authority or consent of the Roman Catholic church. There 
is, however, the Rhemish Testament published by the author- 
ity of a portion of the church and from it we can find the 
doctrine of Bellarmine, just referred to, explicitly taught in 
notes, appended by the same gentleman of the red hat. In 
his comment on John 15:1 — ''Every branch in me" etc. — he 
says: "Christ hath some branches in his body mystical that be 
fruitless; therefore ill-livers also may be members of Christ's 
church." Ill-livers, (mark it) may be members. This is an 
authoritative, infallible utterance, often repeated and every- 
where avowed as the true doctrine of the Roman Catholic 
church. ''Ill livers/' wicked men, infidels, reprobates, vicious 
characters, those guilty of crimes of every enormity and color, 
may then continue members of the Roman church,- while they 
acknowledged the pope and priesthood, and made profession of 
faith in the Catholic Church. According to this atrocious con- 
ception of ecclesiastical and sacerdotal religion, all that happen 
to be born in Catholic countries, infidels, atheists, hooligans 
and all the total depravities, belched up from the underworld 
slums of great cities, are enrolled in her holy communion. Her 
gates are wide as the human race. It is all church and no 
world with her. Purcell, like all the rest, had no other con- 
ception of a church but the church of a nation, with temporal 
power and a political head. Holy Catholic Church ! 



Morals and Doctrine 139 

Well, this whole business reminds me of the French savant's 
definition of a lobster, ''A lobster,'* said he, *'is a red fish 
that walks backward/* Whereupon another savant ventured 
the observation that the definition of the learned gentleman 
was first-class, in every particular, except that a lobster was 
not red, not a fish and did not walk backwards. Holy 
Catholic Church, exhaustively accurate, scientific and true, ex- 
cept it is not holy, not catholic and not a church. Mr. Camp- 
bell did not tell this story for the all sufficient reason that 
it did not exist in his day. On the contrary, not to make his 
drive too fast and furious, he declared, at this juncture of 
affairs, that the Roman Catholics in the United States are 
probably the best body of Catholics in the world, especially 
those who are native citizens. 

No doubt, there is an obvious reason for this. Every man 
in existence is the product of three forces, organization, edu- 
cation and circumstances; or, in more scientific phrase, hered- 
ity, environment and training. Every individual Catholic, 
born and reared in America, has been raised and moulded 
under a predominating Protestant environment, and by con- 
tact with the democratic institutions of our American civiliza- 
tion, and is, therefore, largely out of touch and, practically, 
out of sympathy with the autocracy and the worst of the 
morally corrupting influences of the Roman papacy. Popery 
is the quintessence of autocracy, political, social, and spiritual. 
It is irreconcilably and hopelessly at war with American 
democracy and with the American conception of authority. 
There is something in current Romanism, known as Ameri- 
canism, which had barely commenced to function at the time 
of this debate. The Pope and all the red hats in his kingdom 
have been making strenuous efforts to expel this American 
virus from the blood of holy mother church. It is a dangerous 
symptom and must be arrested at all hazards. It means im- 
provement and progress, and infallibility has no place for 
intellectual expansion or moral elevation or change of any 
kind. "Always the same," and hence the spirit of Christian 



140 Debates That Made History 

liberty and democratic freedom and progress must be resisted 
to the last ditch and the last man. 

It has been inhibited, prohibited, interdicted, contradicted, 
condemned, denounced and bulled by the Vatican authorities, 
but to no purpose, except to make bad matters worse. The 
*Vill to power" and the strong determination to arrest this 
cosmic process of evolution and Americanization is found in 
the consciousness that American democracy has no more use 
nor place for a pope than New Testament Christianity has 
for a priest. Yes, Mr. Campbell was doubtless right. The 
American Catholic is the best, best because his circumstances 
have made him the most enlightened progressive and liberal, 
but it is a long way to Tipperary, ''a long way to go," and it 
will be a long time before he can make the Roman Catholic 
church, with its autocratic head, a safe place for American 
democracy. 

I have spoken of Bishop Purcell's innocency of any thing 
in the nature of logic, from premises to a conclusion, that will 
hold water. I have given an illustrative instance in this 
paper, and will proceed to give another as it fits in well in 
this connection. 

Mr. Campbell had fixed the birthday of the Roman Catholic 
church on the 16th day of July, 1054, the occasion of the 
final separation of the Latin from the Greek church. In 
reply the Bishop said: 

Therefore Mr. Campbell must admit that the church from which 
she — the Roman Church — separated, was the true and uncorrupted 
church of Christ. 

Mr. Campbell replied: 

No, that is what logicians call a non-seguitiurj it does not follow. 
The gentleman seems to reason as if it were invariable that when 
one sect separates from another, the body from which it separates, 
must necessarily be the true church. This is not logical. A new 
sect may spring from the bosom of the worst sect on earth ; but does 
this prove that the mother sect has piety, character or authority? 
Neither does it follow that in the year 1054 the Greek church, though 
the mother or the sister of the Roman, was the true church of Christ. 



Morals and Doctrine 141 

When it becomes necessary I may show that both the Greek and 
the Roman schisms had, long before 1054, been separated from the 
apostolic church. 

It became necessary and he showed in the most illuminating, 
compelling, and edifying part of this debate, that both of these 
boasted Catholicisms, Greek and Roman — as though there 
could be two at the same time, apostatized from the original 
apostolic church, many long centuries before they separated 
from each other in the summer of 1054. 



I 



CHAPTER XIV 

THE CAMPBELL-PURCELL DEBATE: ORIGIN 
OF THE PAPACY 

The Bishop Contends for a Petrine Papacy and Lays it on 
the New Testament. Mr. Campbell Counters the Assault on 
Peter and Gives Place of First Honor to Boniface III, in the 
Year 60^ A. D. 



PROPOSITION II. 

Her notion of apostolic succession is without any 
foundation in the Bible, in reason, or in fact; an im- 
P'osition of the most injurious consequences, built upon 
unscriptural and anti-scriptural traditions, resting 
wholly upon the opinions of interested ana fallible men. 

Mr. Campbell affirms. 
Bishop Purcell denies. 



CHAPTER XIV 

THE CAMPBELL-PURCELL DEBATE: ORIGIN OF THE 

PAPACY 

THERE are textual battles in this debate that have the 
ring and tang of a real fight. One of the most notable 
of these exegetic tilts was a grammatical dispute over the 
antecedent of a pronoun in our Lord's triple question to 
Peter: "Lovest thou me more than these?'' What is the an- 
tecedent of the pronoun these, was the point at issue. ^^Lovest 
thou me more than these?*' — ^What? This opened up a field 
of ambiguity large enough for a gigantic scuffle. The pro- 
noun might refer to anyone of three things : 

1. Lovest thou me more than these other disciples love me? 

2. Lovest thou me more than these fellow apostles of yours? 

3. Lovest thou me more than thou lovest these fish — these com- 
mercial and worldly trappings to which you have returned as a 
means of livelihood? 

PurcelFs contention that Peter was the first pope, compelled 
him, of course, to choose the first, and to say, that Peter being 
the first official primate of the Apostolate and founder of the 
Holy see, must, of necessity, possess the supreme qualification 
of love for service and spiritual leadership, beyond any of his 
contemporaries or fellow Apostles. Mr. Campbell called atten- 
tion to the impossibility of this Romanized interpretation. 
Peter was not omnipotent nor was he a telepathic mind ex- 
plorer. He did not, and could not know whether he loved 
Christ more or less than his disciple companions. There would 
have been little sense, and less fitness, in asking Peter such a 
question at this time. Mr. Campbell, in his search for a proper 
antecedent of the pronoun, preferred the last of the three con- 
structions: Lovest thou me more than thou lovest these fish, 

145 



146 Debates That Made History 

these boats, nets, apparatus or these victuals and this worldly 
employment? The contextual circumstances, leading up to 
the interview that prompted this interrogation of Peter, indi- 
cate clearly enough the correctness of Mr. Campbell's con- 
struction. 

Purcell replied by a mocking reference to it as a *'fish story/' 
characterizing it as a degrading comparison not worthy of 
serious notice. Mr. Campbell conceded the primacy or su- 
periority of Peter on one or more of four possible counts, viz ; 
age, talents, character, office. How did Bishop Purcell know 
it was official superiority, when it is far more likely to have 
been Peter's age, experience, and personality that fitted him for 
moral leadership in the function of giving instruction to 
Christ's disciples, weak and strong, young and old? The 
truth is, Christ never conferred official authority on anybody 
for any purpose. He selected men according to their qualities 
and opportunities to discharge certain moral and spiritual func- 
tions necessary to the on going of his kingdom, nothing more 
and nothing different. 

If Christ had been in the diplomatic and political business 
of conferring and distributing offices he had already conferred 
on Peter the highest office that the kingdom had to offer. When 
and where did Peter evacuate this office of Apostle, prophet, 
teacher, missionary, to become the official and universal head of 
a church, not then in existence; or did he hold down both jobs 
at the same time? If Peter was an Apostle, as the certainly 
was, he could not become the bishop of a church, *'A king, a 
justice of the peace, the Bishop of London and the vicar of 
Bray.'' 

The most crucial contest over the grammatical structure of 
a sentence, the most decisive exegetical battle of the great war, 
was over Matt. 16:17, 18. ''Thou art Peter and upon this 
rock I will build my church," and ''I will give unto thee the 
keys of the kingdom of heaven." 

Peter, on the strength of these passages, our Romanist 
friends tell us, was the foundation of the church, and, there- 



I 



Origin of the Papacy 147 

fore, the first pope, the wielder of the keys and the dispenser 
of salvation and damnation for all time. Hence, the declar- 
ation of Boniface III, the first Pope: 

Moreover we declare and say and define and pronounce to every 
human creature, that it is altogether necessary to salvation to be 
subject to the Roman Pontiff. 

This horrific piece of blasphemous ignorance and arrogance 
finds its chief support on a gross perversion of the first part of 
this Petrine passage, and a transparent misinterpretation of the 
second part. *^Thou art Peter (petros) and upon this rock 
(petra) I will build my church," or, literally, thou art a stone 
and upon this rock I will build my church. His lordship, the 
Bishop, quotes his Roman Catholic Bible the Latin Vulgate, 
which converts the feminine petra (rock) into a masculine 
noun to correspond to the masculine petros, and then the 
Syriac comes in to show that petra has no gender ! This is the 
grammar of religion, according to Rome, that puts Pope Peter 
I solid on the rock foundation of the church, Mr. Campbell's 
analysis puts the matter in a clear and convincing light. 

But petros and petra sound alike and, therefore, though of dif- 
ferent gender, case and person they must be identical ! Of the per- 
son and case we have said enough (for my friend has not attempted 
to refute it). Of the difference in gender, he will tell us that it was 
written in Syriac and that the word, signifying stone, has no gender. 
This is gratuitous. He can produce no copy of Matthew in Syriac ; 
the only authentic copy we have is that before me. It is the Greek 
version of Matthew: "Thou" is in the second person and "this" is 
in the third. Petros is masculine and petra is feminine. It is im- 
possible for language to do more to prevent mistake ; and he that 
would attempt to explain away these three, gender, person, and case, 
is not subject to the laws of language, neither indeed can be. 

Just before this Mr. Campbell had said : 

We Protestants say that the church is founded on the thing con- 
fessed. Christ himself is indeed the rock; but, figuratively, the truth 
which represents him is the rock. I was struck with astonishment 
when I heard my worthy opponent say, that Peter was the rock and 
Christ only a stone in this spiritual temple! 



148 Debates That Made History 

At this point Bishop Purcell arose and explained: that he 
had said that Christ was "the corner stone which was to 
strengthen and give consistency to the foundation ;" and Peter 
*^the rock which was to strengthen and give consistency to the 
superstructure." 

Mr. Campbell proceeded: "Christ the corner stone! and 
Peter the rock! Does this help the matter?'* He then took 
up First Corinthians 3, and, as with a besom of destruction, 
swept the ground clear of papal stones and rocks, and rubbish 
heaps, and junk of all kinds; "Other foundation can no man 
lay than which is laid'' — which is — Peter! No indeed, but 
"which is Jesus Christ." Then Peter is but a stone as his 
name imports. But there were eleven other stones of equal 
value; for says the Holy Spirit, the church is built upon the 
foundation of the Apostles — all of the Apostles; and of the 
prophets, too. When all these stones are at the foundation, 
and Christ the chief corner, where is the room for Peter the 
rock?" And we might add to this, if addition were needed, 
that Peter was the doorkeeper, the key-wielder of that rock- 
structured temple and could not, therefore, at the same time, 
be its foundation. 

But what about the "keys" problem, the power to open and 
shut, to remit and retain sins? By the express and unmistak- 
able direction of Jesus, Peter possessed the keys. Supreme ec- 
clesiastic and universal headship was conferred on him — exclu- 
sive authority to open and shut the doors of the kingdom, a 
power which has been exercised by all the popes from Peter to 
the present incumbent of the Holy see. This is the Romish 
interpretation of the key episode in the conversation at Cea- 
sarea Philippi. The celebrated A. B. Bruce of Scotland, the 
most eminent synoptic specialist of his time, delivered many 
lectures and wrote many books on synoptic problems. I heard 
him say, in a course of lectures at the summer school of The- 
ology in Oxford in 1892, if there was any reason for believing 
that these passages could be made to bear the construction put 
upon them by the Roman Catholic church, he would not hesi- 



Origin of the Papacy 149 

tate for a moment to advocate their swift excision from the 
New Testament, as never having been uttered by Jesus Christ. 
He declared, with passionate emphasis, that this juggling, 
priestly conception and explanation could never have emanated 
from the prophetic mind of Jesus the Master. He was not 
built that way. 

Happily, however, there was no necessity for being afraid 
that the text could be tortured into even a squint in the direc- 
tion of the priestly misconstruction. Mr. Campbell has shown 
this beyond the shadow of a doubt. Peter being appointed, on 
account of his fitness, in a time of crisis, was the first to exer- 
cise the privilege of proclaiming the conditions of entrance into 
the new reign of God about to be ushered in. As a matter of 
fact, and in harmony with the testimony of inspired history, 
Peter did use the keys in the admission of 5,000 into the king- 
dom on the first Pentecost after our Lord's resurrection. Did 
anybody ever hear of a Pope doing anything like this? Sub- 
sequently Peter used the same keys in the admission of the 
Gentiles at the household of Cornelius. They gave him no 
authority, in any official sense, not possessed by all the Apos- 
tles, and all other Christians on the face of the earth. 

As to John 20:22, "Whose soever sins ye remit,'* etc., being 
a sufficient prop of authority for priestly absolution. These 
words are its complete condemnation : for they were spoken to 
a general community of men and women belonging to the 
Christian brotherhood, and they commission the entire body of 
believers to "remit" human sins; that is to say, to announce 
the terms upon which the evangel operates in human life. 
Christianity, if there is a word of truth in the New Testament, 
is not a hierarchy; it is a brotherhood, and one of its central 
truths is the common priesthood of all believers. Beyond this 
common priesthood there is no other. There is no necessity 
for any other. 

But Mr. Campbell is out gunning for popes — big game, so to 
speak — and finding no trace of one in the Apostle to the cir- 
cumcision, he begins a famous journey down the historic line. 



150 Debates That Made History 

and looking keenly and carefully about him on the way, he 
finds no trace nor trail nor scent of a full grown specimen, till 
he reaches the year of our Lord 586. Here the scent warms 
up and the tracks are plain, but the real prey is not yet in 
sight. This was in the time of Gregory the Great of Rome 
and of John the faster of Constantinople. Already the papal 
bee had begun to buzz and sting in the bonnet of this patriarch 
faster, John of the Greek church, who assumed the title of 
the universal father and supreme head of the church, in a 
council, held in this same year, 586. 

In this eventful year, it appears, that the papal bee had be- 
come badly tangled in the hair of his holiness, the patriarch of 
Rome and trouble was brewing. Gregory, the renowned Ro- 
m.an saint of the period, protested, with vituperative bitterness, 
against the elevation of John to the supreme and universal 
headship of the church. He characterized the attempt to ele- 
vate him as ^^proud, blasphemous, anti-Christian and diabol- 
ical,'' and said that the Bishops of Rome refused to take this 
title upon them, ^lest they should seem to encroach upon the 
rights of other bishops.'' Something dropped at this time and 
events moved rapidly to consummation. Mauritius, the then 
reigning emperor of the east, died at the hands of Phocas, a 
villianous centurion of his own army. Mauritius, as might 
have been expected, favored the pretensions of the Bishop of 
Constantinople and turned a deaf ear to the importunities of 
Gregory on the subject of taking from Bishop John the title 
of universal father, so painful to the pride and humility of 
the great Gregory. For, as we have just noted, the saint had 
written to the emperor on the arrogance of John, metropolitan 
of the great diocese of the east. Mauritius was supplanted and 
the throne usurped by Phocas, the villain, who not only put 
him to sleep, but caused the murder of his wife and seven chil- 
dren, that no rival might appear to thwart his plans. Greg- 
ory the Great rejoiced at the death of the emperor, and hailed 
the elevation of his murderer to the throne. Gregory conse- 
crated him in the church of St. John the Baptist at Constant!- 



Origin of the Papacy 151 

nople, and Phocas, as a reward for his consecration and favor- 
able regards, conferred upon the successor of Gregory, Boni- 
face the third, the title of Universal Patriarch in the very 
sense in w^hich it had been repudiated by Gregory. Thus in 
the year of 606 A.D., tw^o years after the death of the saint, 
the first pope vs^as placed in the chair of St. Peter, if indeed 
Peter had ever sat in a chair in Rome, by one of the blackest 
hearted animals that ever reigned over that unholy pagan 
mess, known in history, as the Roman Empire. 

Gibbon the historian in his ''Decline and Fall of the Roman 
Empire," thus speaks of the consecration of the beautiful 
Phocas, first of the emperors of Rome to turn pope maker. 

As soon as the patriarch (St. Gregory) was assured of his ortho- 
dox belief, he consecrated the successful usurper in the church of St. 
John the Baptist. On the third day, amidst the acclamations of a 
thoughtless people, Phocas made his public entry in a chariot, drawn 
by four white horses; the revolt of the troops was rewarded by a 
lavish donation, and the new sovereign, after visiting the palace, be- 
held from his throne the games of the hippodrome. 

Mr. Campbell remarked, at this point, *'but the infidel has 
good reason to laugh at the saint, where he records the exulta- 
tion of Gregory at the death of Mauritius,'' and continued 
his reading from Gibbon. 

As a subject and a Christian it was the duty of Gregory to ac- 
quiesce in the established government; but the joyful applause, with 
which he salutes the fortunes of the assassin, has sullied, with in- 
delible disgrace, the character of the saint. The successor of the 
Apostles might have inculcated, with decent firmness, the guilt of 
blood and the necessity of repentance ; he is content to celebrate the 
deliverance of the people and the fall of the oppressor ; to rejoice that 
the piety and benignity of Phocas have raised him by providence to 
the Imperial Throne ; to pray that his hands may be strengthened 
against all his enemies, and to express a wish, perhaps, a prophecy, 
that after long and triumphant reign, he may be transferred from a 
temporal to an everlasting kingdom. 

Pagan politics and superstition and dense moral corruption, 
the abomination of desolation in the holy place, masquerading 



152 



Debates That Made History m 



in the name of Him who said, '*My kingdom is not of this 
world/' How does it look?*' 

The Bishop, in rebuttal of the testimony of the historian, de- 
clared that Gibbon, when a lad of 16 read a book of the holy 
mother church which convinced him of the truth of the Cath- 
ohc religion. His bigoted, Protestant father took the book 
from him, exiled him to France, where in a virtual state of in- 
carceration, he lived on bread and water, where all literary 
pap from Rome was cut off. Gibbon became an infidel and a 
hater of religion. **Alas" the Bishop piously remarked, **sad 
proof of the restraints on liberty of conscience, as exemplified 
in Protestant communities. '^ Say, isn't that the pot calling the 
kettle ? 



CHAPTER XV 

THE CAMPBELL-PURCELL DEBATE: MOOTED 
QUESTIONS OF HISTORY 

Rome Camouflages and Denies to Hide Historic Deformi- 
ties, Putting on the Livery of Heaven to Serve the Devil. 
Disputed Points of History Invariably Turn Out in Mr, 
Campbell's Favor, 



PROPOSITION III. 

She is not uniform in her faith, or united in her 
members; but mutable and fallible, as any other sect 
of philosophy or religion — Jewish, Turkish or Chris- 
tian — a confederation of sects with a politico-ecclesias- 
tic head. 

Mr. Campbell affirms. 

Bishop Purcell denies. 



CHAPTER XV 

THE CAMPBELL-PURCELL DEBATE: MOOTED QUES- 
TIONS OF HISTORY 

WHILE on the subject of popes and the papacy, Bishop 
Purcell admitted fifty bad popes out of two hundred. 
That is to say, twenty-five per cent, or one in four of 
the holy fathers w^ho had occupied the chair of St. Peter, 
down to this debate in 1837 were bad men. From the point 
of view of the lowest standards of human decency, they were 
wicked reprobates and common sinners. In extenuation of 
this somewhat embarrassing situation, if not in justification 
of the fact, the bishop reminded his opponent that there was 
one hypocrite and traitor among the twelve apostles. Mr. 
Campbell's reply to this attempted palliation of papal bad- 
ness, occupies a page of brevier type, the substance of which 
may be expressed in a sentence or two. Judas repented of 
his crime, and was so stung and tortured by remorse and grief 
that he had the decency to go out and hang himself! How 
many of these unholy monstrosities, official representatives of 
God and vicars of Jesus Christ, whose betrayal of the Lord 
was infinitely worse, and infinitely less excusable than that of 
poor Judas — how many of these had the conscience, the cour- 
age, and the manhood to go and do likewise! There is no 
historic parallel of infamy, perfidy and brazen criminality to 
these so-called holy fathers, who were put up by a so-called 
holy church, and the so-called holy Roman Empire, to rule 
over the body of Christ on earth. If like people like priest, 
what kind of a church was it that did the putting up ? 

The most exciting episode of the debate occurred on the 
last day, but one. There was a great explosion of accumulated 
emotion on the Catholic side and it was as morally significant 
and characteristic as it was emotional. The keenest and 

155 



156 Debates That Made History 

most literary of the reporters and reviewers present, and he 
was an outsider, made this remark, in his reflections on the 
discussion : 

Towards the conclusion of the debate, the Bishop increased in 
excitement, so much so, that, on one occasion, during the afternoon 
of the day previous to its termination, when he supposed Mr. Camp- 
bell had quoted inaccurately from a Roman Catholic author, it ap- 
peared almost unnatural. 

Dr. Richardson, in his Memoirs of Alexander Campbell, 
gives us a good description and abbreviation of the story, 
which makes it convenient for me to draw most of my nar- 
rative material from him. 

The quotation, referred to, as the occasion of Bishop Pur- 
cell's singular excitement, was from the "Moral Theology" of 
Alphonsus de Ligori, of which a synopsis, in English, had 
been given by a Mr. Smith of New York, a convert from 
Romanism. The passage reads thus: 

A Bishop, however poor he may be, cannot appropriate, to him- 
self, pecuniary fines without the license of the Apostolic See. But he 
ought to apply them to pious uses. Much less can he apply those 
fines to anything else than religious uses, which the Council of Trent 
has laid upon the nonresident clergymen, or upon those clergymen 
wjho keep concubines. 

Mr. Campbell had introduced this passage to show, that 
amongst the Roman clergy, marriage was a greater sin than 
concubinage, because marriage produced instant excommuni- 
cation while concubinage was fined and winked at. Bishop 
Purcell declared that no such doctrine was ever taught by 
Catholics, and that no such passage was ever written by St. 
Ligori. 

"I have examined these volumes," pointing to the nine volumes 
of Ligori on the stand, ''from cover to cover, and, in none of them, 
can so much as a shadow be found for the infamous charges. I 
have pledged myself to show to every man of honor, in the city, that 
the last allegation, read by the gentleman, purporting to be from 
the works of Ligori, is not to be found in the works of that author.'' 



I 



Mooted Questions of History 157 

The Bishop then called on Prof. Biggs to examine the nine 
volumes of Ligori to see, if he could find the passage referred 
to by Mr. Smith. But the Professor, finding that the paging 
did not accord with that of the edition used by Mr. Smith, 
declined further examination. The Bishop then referred the 
case to Mr. Kinmont, a classic teacher in the city, who, after 
having had a day to examine, was brought upon the stage by 
the Bishop and testified that he had not been able to find the 
passage. Great excitement was naturally produced by the 
directness of the issue, thus formed, and the vast importance, 
which the bishop seemed to attach to it. Mr. Campbell, not 
being able to find the passage from the reference in Mr. 
Smith's synopsis, promised to investigate the matter and F. 
W. Emmons, who was present, having at his request dis- 
patched a note to Mr. Smith, received from him at once a 
reply, stating that the passage in question was on page 444 of 
the eighth volume. Upon receiving this communication Mr. 
Campbell asked, from Bishop Purcell, the loan of St. Ligori's 
works, and, on turning to page 444, volume eight, found 
every word in the Bishop's oivn edition just as had been 
quoted. He then took the original Latin and the synopsis of 
Mr. Smith to Mr. Kinmont, who then certified that Mr. 
Smith's, as quoted, was a faithful translation of the passage. 

The Bishop's emphatic denial of the existence of such a 
doctrine, in the Moral Theology ^ at the time, had considerable 
effect in creating doubt upon the subject, but the result of the 
investigation greatly injured the cause he defended and justly 
served to throw discredit upon his frequent denials and de- 
nunciations in regard to other authorties and evidences, which 
Mr. Campbell adduced in support of his propositions. The 
people could hardly impute, to ignorance of the Moral Theol- 
ogy of his own church, or of the writings of St. Ligori, his 
positive avowments that no such doctrine as the one in ques- 
tion was held by Roman Catholics and, consequently, were 
led to attribute his bold denials to motives to which the ap- 
plication of the epithet moral was as inappropriate as it was to 



158 Debates That Made History 

his Theology itself, but certainly quite as much needed for 
the information of the credulous. 

This reminds us of another passage, at arms, over a bit of 
documentary evidence, almost as sensational, and quite as 
damaging to the Moral Theology of Rome, which occurred 
on the first and second days of the debate. Part of this has 
been used before for another purpose. It was the clash over 
the veracity and historicity of Du Pin, one of the best known 
and most highly esteemed of Roman Catholic scholars and 
historians. According to his testimony, based on the indisput- 
able facts of history, in the year 325 A.D., when the council 
of Nice assembled, the first of the great ecclesiastical coun- 
cils, there were four reigning bishops, whose jurisdictions cor- 
responded to the four political divisions of the Roman empire; 
Rome, Constantinople, Antioch and Alexandria. In process 
of time Jerusalem was added, and these all became radiating 
centers of ecclesiastical power and patronage. As. Mr. Camp- 
bell remarked, in a restatement of the witness of Du Pin, 

The bishops, of each diocese, assumed a sort of primacy, in his 
own district; and, as various interferences and rivalries in juris- 
diction occurred, the Council of Nice so far decided that the same 
power should be given to them all — that all primates should be co- 
ordinate. Hence Du Pin could not find, in that council, authority 
for the supreme primacy of Rome. 

Purcell answered this by denying the authority of Du Pin 
and asserting the supremacy of the Roman bishop. Mr. 
Campbell proceeded to show, by unquestioned Catholic au- 
thorities, that Du Pin was a recognized scholar and historian 
of the church, but, inasmuch as his opponent had rejected and 
denounced Du Pin he would not be further used, as he had 
not been already, except where he was explicitly and unmis- 
takably backed up and abundantly corroborated by the ac- 
knowledged authorities of the church, the Bishop of Cincin- 
nati being the judge. The only possible explanation of this 
mental attitude of his, is the fact that he was more concerned 
for the salvation of a theory of ecclesiastical history, for ob- 
vious reasons, than he v/as for the salvation of the truth ; and 



t 



Mooted Questions of History 159 

this, while bad enough for theology, is much worse for the 
ethical or moral side of the proposition, when a man deliber- 
ately and willfully shuts his eyes to facts because they stand in 
the way of his theories he is dishonest, and dishonesty is the 
worst kind of immorality. 

But this is not the particular point in the present count 
against Rome's theological morality. This man Du Pin wrote 
a book on the life of St. Gregory, who held the pre-eminence 
for the most unadulterated saintship in the Roman calendar, 
for five hundred years. He was not only *'St. Gregory" but 
"St. Gregory the Great," under whose influence and manipu- 
lation his successor became the first pope of Rome. We 
caught a slight glance, in the last chapter, on the joint author- 
ity of Du Pin and Gibbon of the color and tinge of the moral 
concepts that trickled through the brain grooves of St. Greg- 
ory, when he took the leading part in the consecration of the 
assassin, Phocas, to the throne of the Holy Roman Empire. 
It is Du Pin who tells us that the great saint not only opposed 
the title of pope or universal patriarch, in the case of John the 
Faster, as proud, heretical, blasphemous and diabolical, but 
declared, with violent and frantic emphasis, that no other 
bishop should assume this pompous and arrogant title. But, 
when a new dynasty ascended the throne and offered the title 
to a Roman bishop, although the purchase of treachery and 
blood it had lost its blasphemy and impiety, and we find the 
successor of St. Gregory wearing the title of universal patri- 
arch or pope without a scruple or sign of consciousness that 
a degenerate religion had dropped to the lowest moral levels 
of paganism. And here we reach the milk in the cocoanut 
and are able to understand why Bishop Purcell waved Du Pin 
and Gibbon aside by rejecting the authority of the one and 
calling the other an infidel. Not so much because the truth of 
history had landed a knock out blow square on the solar 
plexus of papal pretensions for the first six centuries of the 
church's existence, but because the moral color of the transac- 
tion was perilously shady. 



160 Debates That Made History 

When Gregory, the Saint, had his fill of rejoicing over the 
assassination of the Greek Emperor, whom the saint disliked, 
because he refused to pinch off the head of John the Faster, 
who had assumed universal headship of the church with the 
seat of the empire in Constantinople; he proceeded to the con- 
secration of the murderer and usurper Phocas to the throne 
of the empire, preceded with a slight theological examination, 
like that used in the ordination of a priest. When the saint, 
we are told, was satisfied that the candidate, for imperial 
honors, held orthodox views on the doctrines of the church, he 
consecrated him Sovereign of the Empire of holy Rome. Be 
it said, to the shame of ecclesiastical historians, that it re- 
mained for an infidel to have enough intellect and moral 
sensibility to sense and say the heinousness and moral turpi- 
tude of the whole unsavory business. He remarked, in a tone 
of disgust and repulsion, that the afJair had sullied with 
indelible disgrace the character of the saint ; and the character 
of the church represented by the saint fared even worse; for 
it was out of gratitude for this consecration (may the Lord 
have mercy on the word) of a villian to the throne of empire, 
with the church behind it, that inspired said villain to elevate 
Gregory's successor to spiritual empire, the universal head- 
ship of the church. Then little time was lost; no grass grew 
under their feet in proceeding to Constantinople, where with 
less ceremony they took off the ecclesiastical head of poor 
John the Faster, relegated him to the shades of a disgraced 
oblivion and the new pontiff at Rome, made by an immoral 
and godless emperor, as the first of the popes, like Alexander 
Selkirk, 

He was monarch of all he surveyed; 

There were none his rights to dispute; 
From the center all round to the sea, 

He was lord of the fowl and the brute. 

Now, contrast if j^ou please, the vaulting ambition, the 
odious and strutting arrogance, the silly vanity, and brutal 
tyranny of these moral degenerates, who ruled over church 



Mooted Questions of History 161 

and state, with the simple democracy and loving fraternity, 
the sympathetic and unselfish brotherliness, the union of all 
who love, in the service of all who suffer, expressed by the 
words of our Lord in Matt. 20:25-28: 

Ye know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and 
their great ones exercise authority over them. Not so shall it be 
among you; but whosoever would be great among you shall be 
your minister; and whosoever would be first among you shall be 
your servant; even as the Son of man came not to be ministered 
unto, but to minister and to give his life a ransom for many. 

How does that accord with the political autocracy and 
moral decadence of historic Rome? 

Mr. CampbelFs first speech, on the fourth proposition, was 
an intellectual phenomenon, a marvel of knowledge, erudition 
and interpretative power. It electrified the audience and par- 
alyzed the Bishop. Dr. Richardson says of it: 

His next speech of an hour, on the fourth proposition, was so 
grand and overwhelming that it made a most profound impression, 
not only upon the audience but apparently upon Bishop Purcell him- 
self, who, it was observed, seemed quite unable to recover from the 
force of Mr. Campbell's graphic delineation of Romanism and its 
identification with "the Babylon" of John, "the Man of Sin" of Paul, 
and "the little horn" of Daniel's vision. 

This gripping and masterly interpretation of the apoc- 
alyptic visions of the Old and New Testaments, and their 
literal verification and materialization, in a corrupt and per- 
secuting papacy, the lineal and logical successor of the pagan 
Rome of the Caesars, has settled the question of these proph- 
ecies once for all. Modern critics and scholars, influenced by 
political considerations and moral changes, which the progress 
of civilization has forced upon "the mother church/' are 
disposed to let her down in a soft place, by alleging the fulfill- 
ment of these prophetic symbols in the beastology of pagan 
Rome. I wonder if it ever occurs to these gentlemen that 
these two institutions are really one and the same; that papal 



162 Debates That Made Histojy 

Rome is pagan Rome, continued up to the time when the pope 
had his teeth drawn in the loss of his temporal power? I 
seriously recommend to them the careful perusal and study 
of this great speech, made by Alexander Campbell in the City 
of Cincinnati 83 years ago and the feeble reply made to it by 
his learned opponent. If they do, they will learn a thing or 
two, or perhaps relearn a few, that, owing to politics and the 
modern rush of things, had faded out of their minds. 



CHAPTER XVI 

THE CAMPBELL-PURCELL DEBATE: REAL 
APOSTOLIC SUCCESSION 

The Line of Cleavage between the Apostolic Church and 
the Roman-Greek Apostasy, The Real Apostolic Succession, 
and the Prophetic Line from Christ and the Apostles, Effects 
of the Discussion and a Final Review from the Outside, 



PROPOSITIONS IV, V, VI, VII. 

4. She is the "Babylon" of John the "Man of sin" of 
Paul, and the Empire of the ''Youngest Horn" of Dan- 
iel's Sea Monster. 

5. Her notions of purgatory, indulgences, auricular 
confession, remission of sins, transsubstantiation, super- 
erogation, etc., essential elements of her system, are im- 
moral in their tendency, and injurious to the well- 
being of society, religious and political. 

6. Notwithstanding her pretensions to have given us 
the Bible, and faith in it, we are perfectly independ- 
ent of her for our knowledge of that book, and its 
evidences of a divine original. 

7. The Roman Catholic religion, if infallible and 
unsusceptible of reformation, as alleged, is essentially 
anti-American, being opposed to the genius of all free 
institutions, and positively subversive of them, opposing 
the general reading of the scriptures, and the diffusion 
of useful knowledge among the whole community, so 
essential to liberty and the permanency of good govern- 
ment. 

Mr, Campbell affirms. 
Bishop Pur cell denies. 



CHAPTER XVI 

THE CAMPBELL-PURCELL DEBATE: REAL APOSTOLIC 
SUCCESSION 

THE horizontal and perpendicular progress of the gos- 
pel in the Roman Empire — that is to say, its intellectual 
and social progress up and its numerical extension out, — 
paved the way for planting the seeds of demoralization, dis- 
sention, and ultimate moral corruption. The facts of history, 
brought forward by Mr. Campbell in this debate, make it ab- 
solutely certain, that the church captured the world in the 
first two centuries, and in the next two, or less, the world 
made a counter drive, and captured the church. In the con- 
version of Constantine, in the middle of the fourth century, 
and the consummation of this unholy union, by this unholy 
conversion, the church lost its identity and the world didn't. 
The cloven foot of the man of sin, the son of perdition, mys- 
tery Babylon of John, under the grotesque imagery of apoca- 
lyptic beasthood, began to make tracks, distinctly visible, on 
the sands of time, before the end of the first century. A pa- 
gan environment and the old priestly conception of religion 
the Jews had borrowed from Semite heathenism, had com- 
menced to get in their deadly work before John and Paul 
ceased to write. 

With the strongest forces of apostolic and prophetic leader- 
ship withdrawn, it was only a question of time when *^the 
abomination of desolation,'' *^the world, the flesh and the 
devil," would rush in to occupy, and *^make desolate," the 
holy place to selfish and worldly ends. The historic culmina- 
tion of this unholy process was reached in or near the middle 
of the third century, about the year 250 of the Christian era. 
Mr. Campbell at this point, with reference to this period 

165 



166 Debates That Made History 

brings forward a great array of the undisputed facts of history 
to visualize the first fissure in the rock, the first gaping seam 
that separates the apostacy from the original apostolic church 
of the New Testament. 

The Martin Luther of that third century Protestant refor- 
mation was Novatus, who differed from our Luther of the 
16th century, in the fact that he represented a real Church 
of Christ, already existent, which had come down to this day 
from the Apostles. The controversy between Cornelius and 
Novatus, about the Bishopric of Rome, embraced the points 
at issue, which separated the true church from that which was 
then grievously contaminated with error and immorality. 

It was indeed, as Mr. Campbell remarks, a controversy 
about the purity of communion and discipline, rather than 
about articles of doctrine. In modern phrase it was an eth- 
ical, much more than a theological reformation, that those 
early representatives of the holy catholic church of the New 
Testament were trying to bring about in the middle of the 
third century. Eusebius, the oldest of ecclesiastical histori- 
ans, informed us that Novatus and his party were called 
Cathari or Puritans, These were the remnant in the church 
who had not bowed the knee to Baal, who understood the 
mind of Jesus Christ to mean the inspiration, and regulation 
of conduct, with a view to the formation of character, the 
rendition of service, and the determination of destinj^ The 
only charge that Eusebius and Purcell could bring against 
them was their ''Uncharitableness" in refusing to commune 
with those of immoral and doubtful character. 

Waddington, one of the best and most accurate of modern 
church historians, is quoted as thus testifying of the Nova- 
tians, and the effort they made to prevent the disruption of 
the church by part of it hardening into hopeless banality and 
moral corruption: 

Novatian, a presbyter of Rome, was a man of great talents and 
learning, and of character so austere, that he was unwilling, under 
any circumstances of contrition, to readmit those who had been 



Real Apostolic Succession 167 

once separated from the communion of the church. And this sever- 
ity he would have extended, not only to those who had fallen by 
deliberate transgression, but even fro such as had made a forced com- 
promise of their faith under the terrors of persecution. He consid- 
ered the Christian church as a society, wherein virtue and innocence 
reigned universally, and refused any Longer to acknowledge, as 
members of it, those who had once degenerated into unrighteousness. 
This endeavor to revive the spotless moral purity of the primi- 
tive faith was found inconsistent with the corruptions, even of that 
early age; it was regarded with suspicion by the leading prelates 
as a vain and visionary scheme; and those rigid principles, which 
had characterized and sanctified the church in the first century, were 
abandoned to the profession of schismatic sectaries in the third. 

The modern Bishop joined the ancient prelates in a bitter 
denunciation of Novatus, and the real apostolic church repre- 
sented by him, for their heartless uncharity and cruelty in the 
attitude they took up towards apostates professing penitence, 
who had dashed the martyr^s crown, in face of danger, for a 
few more years of physical life, under the camouflage of hea- 
then regularity. In that heroic and martyr age of the Chris- 
tian religion, the greatest virtue and the highest honor was to 
face death for Christ's sake, at the cost of a swift and certain 
martyrdom. 

The unpardonable sin, on the other hand, the blackest and 
most ineffaceable dishonor, was to deny Christ and his cross 
to escape the terrors of persecution. People who recanted, 
who struck their colors and made a cowardly compromise with 
the enemy of truth and life, were identified, by the Holy 
Spirit, as the bunch who had ^'crucified to themselves the son 
of God afresh and put him to an open shame f those who had 
sinned wilfully, after they had received a knowledge of the 
truth, for whom there was no more sacrifice for sin, but a 
certain fearful expectation of judgment, and a fierceness of 
fire which shall devour the adversaries." 

One cannot help wondering if any of these hierarchs, pre- 
lates, and potentates of the apostasy, ancient or modern, ever 
heard these words from Hebrews, written by Paul or one of 
his contemporary disciples? After all their ravings against 



168 Debates That Made History 

Novatus and his brethren, for their **austerity," "severity'* 
and '^uncharitableness" and "Puritanism'' it turns out, upon 
the best of apostolic authority and New Testament practice, 
that the only fault the enemy could find with these early 
Puritans was the most conspicuous of their loyalties to the 
ideals of Jesus Christ, identifying them, beyond a doubt, with 
the apostolic regime and the church as it was at the first. 

These Puritans or reformers, the historic successors to the 
original apostolic church (historians inform us) spread all 
over the world, and continued to oppose the pretensions of the 
apostatic majority, who claimed to be the only true Catholic 
Church. They continued, under the name of Novatians, for 
more than two centuries; but finally were merged into the 
Donatists, who are the same people under another name. 
These Donatists were a very large and prosperous community. 
We read of 278 Donatist bishops in one African council. Of 
these people the historian just cited deposes: 

The Donatists have never been charged with the slightest show 
of truth, with any error of doctrine, or any defect in church Gov- 
ernment or discipline, or any depravity of moral practice; they 
agreed, in every respect, with their adversaries except one, they did 
not acknowledge, as legitimate, the ministry of the African Church, 
but considered their own body to be the true, unoorrupted, universal 
church. 

They were right, too, if the New Testament is to be be- 
lieved. We here get a firm grip upon the line of the true 
apostolic succession, the prophetic line of Simon pure spiritual 
and moral quality to which Christ and the Apostles belonged. 

These Donatists went on for two centuries with their work, 
when they were amalgamated with the Paulicians. They, too, 
were called Puritans, the name always given by Rome and the 
world to those who believe that the church ought to keep the 
moral law of the ten commandments and the Sermon on the 
Mount. The church historian, Jones, joins Waddington, 
Du Pin and Gibbon in testifying that the aim and purpose of 
the Paulicians, like their predecessors, was *'to restore, as far 



Real Apostolic Succession 169 

as possible, the profession of Christianity to all its primitive 
simplicity." Gibbon says: 

The Paulician Teachers were distinguished only by their scrip- 
tural names, by the modest title of their fellow pilgrims; by the 
austerity of their lives, their zeal and knowledge, and the credit of 
some extraordinary gift of the Holy Spirit. But they were incapable 
of desiring, or at least, of obtaining the wealth and honors of the 
Catholic prelacy, such anti-christian pride, they strongly censured. 

Until the appearance of the Waldenses and Albigenses, we 
are told upon incontestable grounds of sound historic testi- 
mony, these Protestants continued to oppose the church of 
nations in the East, and in the West, until, at one time, they 
claimed the title of Catholic. We read of hundreds of bishops 
attending the different councils, in which they met to oppose 
the violent assaults of their enemies. It is sometimes difficult 
to say which were the more numerous party, we are told, those 
in communion with the Cathari, or Puritans, sometimes called 
Novatians, sometimes Donatists, sometimes Paulicians, some- 
times Waldenses, but always, in fact, Protestant and valiant 
contenders for "the faith once for all delivered to the saints." 
After all then, the gates of hell did not prevail against the 
church even in the darkest of the dark ages of Roman dom- 
ination. 

In this connection, and upon the basis of these unimpeach- 
able testimonies, Mr. Campbell brings in a telling summary 
against the institution defended by his opponent. 

"The spirit of true religion seems to have fled from Rome 
from the first appearance of the Novatians. The first schism 
at Rome, acknowledged and recorded by the Roman Catho- 
lic historians, is that which occurred at the election of Corne- 
lius over Novatus. Hence Novatus is called the first anti- 
pope. Du Pin and Barronius, both Catholic witnesses, amply 
testify of the violence by which St. Peter's chair was often 
filled with a vicar after this schism. In the election of Da- 
masas many were killed in the churches of Rome. One hun- 



170 Debates That Made History 

dred and thirty-four persons, beaten to death with clubs, were 
carried out of a single house at this election. 

Had the Holy Spirit anything to do in thus filling the chair 
of St. Peter with a vicar of Christ? Is the church, which 
permits such things, and which has been sustained by such 
means, the true church of God? Is the person, thus elected, 
the supreme head of Christ^s Church — the proper vicar of 
Christ? May we not then say that the spirit of God, on that 
day, had departed frojn Rome? And may we not add, from 
the documents before us, that if there be any truth in history, 
we have found a succession of witnesses for the ancient faith 
against Rome, from the days of the first schism till the present 
hour?" 

It only remains to be added that Purcell made no head- 
way in his feeble efforts to rebut these monumental facts. 
Indeed, he seldom made any effort at all to answer them, for 
the good and sufficient reason that they were unanswerable. 
But, for the lack of time and space, I must pause at this 
point. No attempt has been made to follow up seriatim, or 
in regular succession, the discussion of the seven propositions 
laid down by Mr. Campbell at the beginning. 

My aim has been to touch the vital and determinative points 
of the argument and to use the concrete material that lent it- 
self, the most readily, to narration and illustration, suitable 
to the reading public of our time. No attempt has been made 
to reproduce the discussion of abstractions, dogmatic, theo- 
logical propositions, and mystery concealments, Rome's fa- 
vorite method of sanctifying her superstitions, for the simple 
reason that for all practical purposes, such reproduction would 
have been a waste of space, and an unrighteous appeal to the 
reader's patience. 

The effects and consequences of this debate, in which Mr. 
Campbell had vanquished his strongest opponent, with quite 
as much ease as the lesser lights of his former conflicts, were 
less startling than suggestive. The political press of the city. 



Real Apostolic Succession 171 

which feared Irish influence and the Catholic vote, as much 
then as it does now, was enlisted by Rome to manufacture 
public opinion against Mr. Campbell. The sectarian denom- 
inational organs of Protestant name and affiliation especially 
the Baptist, which disliked Mr. Campbell because it feared the 
success of his religious movement by the advancement of his 
personal reputation, which victory in this debate would neces- 
sarily bring. 

It was the same fraternity which had prayer for the triumph 
of the infidel, Robert Owen, over ''heretic" Campbell, eight 
years before in the same city, who are now equally fervent in 
their supplications for the victory of Rome over the mightiest 
and cleanest of Protestant champions, because of sectarian jeal- 
ousies, which they had not the decency and strength of char- 
acter to hide. These misrepresentations of public opinion so 
incensed the enlightened and fair-minded citizens, who had 
heard the debate, that a great mass meeting was called, at the 
close of the discussion, and these emphatic resolutions were 
passed without a dissenting voice : 

1. Resol^ved, That it is the unanimous opinion of this meeting that 
the cause of Protestantism has been fully sustained throughout this 
discussion. 

2. Resolved, That it is our opinion the arguments in favor of 
Protestantism, and the objections to the terrors of popery have not 
yet been met. 

3. Resolved, That we look forward to the publication of this dis- 
cussion as a powerful antedote to the sophistry and arrogance of all 
the advocates of Romanism: and that we have the fullest confidence 
in submitting it to the impartial decision of the American people. 

4. Resolved, That we approve of the spirit and temper and were 
pleased with the power of argument and the authorities by which 
Mr. Campbell sustained his positions, and concur with him in pos- 
sessing no unkind feeling or prejudices toward individuals, but be- 
lieve the principles of Romanism inconsistent with our free insti- 
tutions. 

The most discriminating and penetrating literary discussion 
of the date, comes to us from the editor of The Philanthropist, 
a brilliant lawyer and a gentleman of high standing and un- 



172 Debates That Made History 

blemished character. There is only room for a couple of ex- 
tracts : 

111 as we thought of Romanism before on many grounds, but 
chiefly because it demands of its rank and file to surrender to the 
'^Officers and Staff," the most precious right that God has bestowed 
on them — the right of judging for themselves on their most impor- 
tant concerns for this life and for that ivhich is to come — and be- 
cause its management is mysteriously and sedulously concealed from 
the inspection of the community, our opinion of it is now tenfold 
more unfavorable. If Bishop Purcell has made for it the best de- 
fense of which it is susceptible or one that's even respectable, it is a 
deeply contrived system of absurdities in theory, and abominations 
in practice, and calls at once for examination, that it may meet with 
the abhorrence of every republican and Christian who has any 
proper regard for personal liberty or intellectual independence. 

A word for Mr. Campbell and his manner of conducting 
the debate: 

So far as Mr. Campbell was concerned we can speak with un- 
alloyed pleasure. His facts were judiciously selected; his historical 
landmarks well chosen, presenting, without the confusion that too 
often occurs from introducing too many things, his case with great 
plainness and simplicity. Every point on which we heard him fully, 
we thought he fully sustained. And then it was all done with such 
unaffected calmness, such dispassionateness and an ardent desire 
to arrive at the truth for the truth's sake ; with such Christian for- 
bearance in the midst of provoking assaults from his adversary (al- 
though he had multiplied opportunities for impaling him) and the 
most ungenerous treatment, received daily from a part of the polit- 
ical press of this city, that, had we ever before entertained any 
prejudices against Mr. Campbell, he would, by his conduct, amidst 
so many and such long continued trials, have well nigh dissipated 
tbem. 



« 



CHAPTER XVII 
THE CAMPBELL-RICE DEBATE 

Last but not Least of the Big Five, Place: Lexington, 
Kentucky, Time: November 15 to December 1, 1843. 
Concerning Environ?nent and Atmosphere, 



I rejoice in the present discussion, because it strikes 
at the main roots of modern partyism — the creeds, the 
baptisms, and the spirits of moral philosophy and hu- 
man expediency. Before a holier and a happier era, we 
must resume the original basis of one Lord, one 
Creed, one Baptism, one Spirit. United on these we 
stand: divided we fall. These opinions, creeds, bap- 
tisms and spirits must be repudiated. Hence the neces- 
sity of discussion. 

— Alexander Campbell, 

Mr. President — With regard to the reformation of 
the sixteenth century and its glorious results, I per- 
fectly agree with my friend, whose address you have 
just heard. And I am truly happy to appear before 
this large audience today in the defence of the great 
doctrines and truths elicited by the investigation of 
those eminent men, who were the honored instruments 
of rescuing the Scriptures from ecclesiastical despotism, 
and proclaiming to the world the fundamental truth, 
that the Bible teaches all that is necessary to be be- 
lieved, or to be done, to secure eternal life. 

—N. L, Rice, 



CHAPTER XVII 

THE CAMPBELL-RICE DEBATE 

I HAVE heard of an old preacher who began all his sermons 
by saying: "The Gospel, my brethern, has its chronology 
and its geography; its beginning time and its beginning place/' 
Passing, as of comparatively little importance, the originating 
circumstances, the arrangement of preliminaries, and the long 
drawn out correspondence, w^hich preceded this, the greatest 
of the world's religious debates, a few lines may be devoted, 
with profit, I think, to the question of time and place, as these 
questions relate themselves to the atmosphere and environ- 
ment, that made the discussion of this character and magni- 
tude, either desirable or possible. There was first, an en- 
vironing intellectual, cultural, and social atmosphere that gave 
to the geographical and chronological conditions the interest 
of a unique situation. 

The far-famed blue grass region of central Kentucky, con- 
sisting of enough territory to make five or six counties of 
ordinary size, with Lexington as the capital, and most re- 
nowned educational center, Athens and Jerusalem rolled in- 
to one, as I have before remarked, has produced more grey 
matter, more cerebral substance to the square inch, more 
thinkers, scholars, teachers, statesmen, orators, and great 
preachers, lawyers and doctors, than any other spot of earth, 
of its size, in the United States, or out of it, as far as my 
knowledge extends. At the time of this debate it was as 
easy to find an intellectual man or a beautiful woman on the 
streets of Lexington, in outlying blue grass towns, as it was 
reputed to be, to find a god in Athens at the time of PauFs 
visit, when he debated with Greek philosophers on the Are- 
opagus at Mar's Hill. 

175 



176 Debates That Made History 

As far back as Alexander Campbeirs first visit to this city 
in the year 1823, immediately after his debate with McCalla, 
in Mason County, a single congregation on a single occasion 
provided brain stimuli in such abundance as to create a pos- 
itive reaction in his mind to a degree of inspiration, under 
the spell, of which he astonished the natives, in a sermon of 
unwonted greatness and power. There was a young man 
listening to that sermon, who declared, forty years later, that 
he had never heard anything to approach it either before or 
since ; this youth became the celebrated Dr. Bell, of Louisville, 
renowned for his scientific skill in his chosen profession, and 
his encyclopedic knowledge in many branches of learning. He 
declared that his mother was the finest Bible student and 
teacher he had ever known, showing that in the original dis- 
tribution of brains, all of the grey matter did not fall to the 
male of the species. These two were parishioners of Dr. 
Fishback, distinguished for his scholarship, his culture, his 
pulpit and platform eloquence, his sweetness and light in 
private life; who, after hearing this great sermon of Mr. 
Campbeirs, preached from his own pulpit, became his devoted 
friend for the rest of his life. 

The Rev. Jeremiah Vardeman, a man of ability, attractive 
personality, and great popularity, Mr. CampbelFs guide in 
his maiden visit to the blue grass capitol, introduced him next 
to Transylvania University and its distinguished president. 
Dr. Horace Holley, a man of fine manners, broad culture, 
liberal principles, and great oratorical powers, in a community 
passionately devoted to oratory, with such spell-binding con- 
temporaries as Clay, Crittenden, Barry, Bowen, S. P. Sharp 
and Ben Hardin. This Presbyterian institution of learning 
— the Presbyterians be it said to their praise have always been 
leaders in the educational field — was in a flourishing condition 
under Dr. Holley 's administration ; great numbers of students 
flocking from South and West to its halls and class rooms, to 
sit at the feet of distinguished teachers in their several de- 



The Campbell-Rice Debate 177 

partments. The Medical College of the University was pre- 
sided over by two of the most eminent medical teachers in 
America, the school itself being only second to the great 
medical institutions of Philadelphia. 

Great men were sprouted here, who afterwards bulked to 
large proportions in the annals of American history. Amongst 
these were two or three of the celebrated Breckinridge family 
and the immortal Jefferson Davis of rebellion fame. Many 
times did I sit, in after years, in the room he occupied in the 
old dormitory in the college campus, trying to absorb what 
inspiration I could from the traditional associations of those 
dingy walls. Lexington in that early day, in addition to its 
cultural advantages, and its bevy of flaming orators, had one 
of the ablest literary periodicals of the West, edited by Wil- 
liam Gibbs Hunt, and a historic public library hardly second 
in value to the best in the country. 

Neighboring Blue Grass towns, Danville, Richmond, 
Georgetown, and Harrodsburg had institutions of learning, 
most of which were of university grade and excellence and 
were presided over by educators, noted generally for scholar- 
ship, literary culture, and oratorical ability. John C. Young, 
president of Center College in Danville, who was character- 
ized by a competent judge as **a gentleman distinguished for 
his urbanity and amiability, as well as for his literary and the- 
ological attainments," was the man Alexander Campbell 
hoped would be chosen for his opponent in the great debate. 
The failure of President Young^s health compelled the substi- 
tution of another name, very much to the regret of Mr. Camp- 
bell, who in his past experience had had enough of bitter sec- 
tarian weeds, enough of partisan and hostile zealotry, and 
very naturally and properly desired that his last and greatest 
debate should be with an urbane Christian gentleman, whose 
spirit and bearing would help to give weight and character 
to the discussion. 



178 Debates That Made History 

The first choice of the Presbyterians to uphold their banner 
in the great decisive battle of a prolonged ecclesiastical war 
was Dr. Robt. J, Breckinridge, the greatest of the great fam- 
ily that bore his name, of whom it was said "none has stood 
higher in the Presbyterian Church in this country for twenty- 
live 5^ears/* When approached by the committee, he said 
emphatically: ''No Sir I wuU never be Alexander Campbeirs 
opponent. A man who has done what he has to defend 
Chritianity against infidelity, and to defend Protestantism 
against the delusions and usurpations of Catholicism, I will 
never oppose in public debate. I esteem him too highly." I 
was present at this great man's funeral, in my early youth, 
and was glad to do him honor. A few days before I had 
listened to a brilliant oration, in the old Lexington Court 
House by his illustrious kinsman, John C. Breckinridge, a 
product of the same "Garden of the gods,'' and perhaps the 
most silver tongued and handsome of contemporaneous Amer- 
ican orators. A young man, at the time of the Campbell 
and Rice debate, he became in later j^ears vice-president of the 
United States, ran for president in the campaign that was 
immortalized by the election of Abraham Lincoln, took part 
in the civil war as a division commander, under Albert Sydny 
Johnson at Shiloh, and subsequently under Braxton Bragg, in 
the great battles of the Western armies, to the close of the 
war. He was dressed in his rebel grey when I heard him 
make that speech in the court house. 

About half way between Lexington, in Fayette County, and 
Versailles in Woodford, there is a little school house in the 
Pisgah neighborhood — it was still there a few years ago — hard 
by a country Presbyterian sanctuary, situated in a grove of 
lovely trees in the midst of a noble woodland pasture so much 
a part of that God-favored land of promise. This little 
structure, built of hewn logs and pointed with lime, in which 
young ideas were trained to shoot, was as historic as it seemed 
to be insignificant. It is always men that make things great. 



The Campbell-Rice Debate 179 

Three boys, who lived in sight of each other, in that aristo- 
cratic vicinity, first swung their legs under benches in this 
pent up Utica. Their names were afterwards known to man- 
kind, as John C. Breckinridge, Thomas Marshall and John J. 
Crittenden, a triad of statesmen spellbinders, unmatched in 
history, as the product of a single neighborhood. Tom Mar- 
shall, as great in thought as he was in expression, who could 
make a better temperance speech when half drunk than he 
could when wholly sober, paid a handsome tribute to his na- 
tive heath and its productive qualities, when he declared that 
the blue grass region was the garden of Eden and Woodford 
County the asparagus bed. This section of the original par- 
adise was as celebrated for the production of great men, and 
beautiful women, and fine horses, as it was happy in the pos- 
session of asparagus beds, hemp fields, maize, and burly to- 
bacco fields in later years. My old parishioner, Harry Ward, 
of Cynthiana, one of Kentucky's greatest criminal lawyers was 
an entrancing talker of the heroic period of classic oratory. 
I have heard him expatiate, by the hour, in a most engaging 
way, of the great forensic battles in which he had measured 
arms, en equal terms, with the mighty men of whom I have 
spoken, and others of their kind. Mrs. Haley bisected his 
stream of talk one evening by thrusting in the question :^'but 
Mr. Ward, what of John J. Crittenden?" ''John J. Crit- 
tenden,'* said he, "why John J. at his worst could beat 'em 
all, and at his best he could beat himself;" shaking his gray 
locks by way of emphasis, and bringing down his open palms 
with a resounding slap upon his knees. Brother Ward was 
a great lover of the Bible, and could defend it against its assail- 
ants, in a manner that would have charmed the soul of Alex- 
ander Campbell. It was worth while to hear him expound 
Shakespeare and the Divine Legation of Moses to his Bible 
class in the Sunday school. He always referred to the Book 
of books as ''God's Bible." 

Theological masters of assemblies were quite as numerous 



180 Debates That Made History 

as legal and political spellbinders. There was Jacob Creath, 
Sr., the man who pronounced the benediction at the close of 
the great debate, of whom it was said he could become gover- 
nor of Kentucky at any time he would consent to have his 
name placed at the head of the ticket in a gubernatorial race. 
He was an Apollo, and an ApoUos of graceful and charming 
eloquence, not surpassed, and scarcely equalled, by any of his 
contemporaries. He came with Mr. Campbell into the ref- 
ormation and became an ornamental figure and a mighty 
force as a pulpit prodigy of his time. And Raccoon John 
Smith, with a sun crowned head and a soul of fire, a master 
of wit and repartee, mighty in word and deed, who baptized 
paedobaptists and ^'capsized'* Baptists by the thousands; who 
enjoyed the unique distinction of preaching to a great audi- 
ence in Mt. Sterling, with only fourteen unconverted people 
present, all of whom in response to his appeal, surrendered, 
and made the good confession on the spot. Smith, who was a 
great admirer and warm friend of Campbell, after hearing 
him preach a great sermon at a convention in Lexington, went 
forward and said: ''Well, Alex., if you keep on improving 
you'll make a right smart chunk of a preacher yet." John 
Augustus Williams, leading educator and founder of Daugh- 
ter's College at Harrodsburg, another source of influence to 
impregnate the air with educational forces, and to fertilize the 
mentality of central Kentucky, wrote the life of John Smith, 
the first and almost the last classic biography in the literature 
of the Disciples. 

The reformation of Barton W. Stone, another giant of 
that fermenting era, began to function at Cambridge, another 
asparagus bed of paradise, in a mighty reaction against French 
skepticism, English deism, and a world gripping indifferentism, 
always a concomitant of infidel revolutions. The reform 
movement of Mr. Stone centering in the blue grass region, 
took great lumps of butter fat from the Presbyterian churns, 
which, when combined with the cream Mr. Campbell had 



The Campbell-Rice Debate 181 

skimmed from Baptist pans, in the same region, made up a un- 
ion of intelligent religious people, firmly secured ten or twelve 
years before the debate in Lexington, with a group of gifted 
preachers, hard to equal in larger communions. Alexander 
Procter and T. P. Haley were born in the heart of the blue 
grass region. Proctor was the greatest of the philosophic 
thinkers, and prophetic interpreters of the Campbellian the- 
ology. Haley was our field marshall in the realm of ecclesi- 
astical administration. Their fathers were neighbors and the 
two boys were first cousins. John A. Brooks, a polished 
pulpiteer, of a slightly later period, who ran for president on 
the Prohibition ticket, and Prof. John Shackelford, the only 
survivor of the "Living Pulpit'' published in 1868, except its 
distinguished editor Dr. W. T. Moore, another lion of the 
tribe of Judah, who came down from those early days — these 
two men came from shimmering spots of blue grass, in Mason 
County, where Mr. Campbell held his second historic debate. 
Prof. Shackelford won distinction as a life long teacher of 
recognized ability, in the University of Kentucky, and as the 
author of a classic biography of Dr. L. L. Pinkerton, another 
genius of the prophetic order, justly famous as the wielder of 
classic speech with both tongue and pen, and the founder of 
the Female Orphan School at Midway, twelve miles from 
Lexington, the most useful and beneficent of all the institu- 
tions established and maintained by the "Reformers,'' as the 
Disciples were then called. 

But what shall the man say that cometh after the king, 
except to announce that the king hath spoken? The match- 
less Henry Clay, monarch of the American Forum, too big a 
man to enter the small doors of the White House, because 
he chose to be right rather than president, whose magnetic 
personality, charm of speech, and compelling intellectual 
power, did more to generate the passion for oratory, and the 
appreciation of brains that characterized the blue grass and 
all Kentucky, than any other single man of the time. This 



182 Debates That Made History 

man was the chairman of the great debate, who presided over 
all its sessions during the sixteen days of its duration. I shall 
have more to say of him and his relation to the discussion be- 
fore I am through. 

From these elevated heights of mentality and culture and 
chain lightening speech, it is not wonderful that currents 
drifted down, even to low bromidic levels, and every common 
man became a devout worshipper at the shrine of one or more 
of these oratorical divinities. John B. Houston another ^'jury 
charmer," of the time and place, who spake with the tongues 
of men and of angels, tells an illustrative story on himself. 
He was prosecuting a man for murder in a great criminal 
suit m Irvin, a little mountain town, just across Kentucky 
River from a blue grass county. As the trial proceeded, he 
observed a lanky hill-billie, with uncombed hair and folds of 
skin hanging as loose upon his forehead, as his shocking hat 
did upon his head, following him about, dogging his heels, 
staring him out of countenance, until Houston, somewhat an- 
noyed, turned upon him and said: 'What is it my friend, do 
you wish to say something to me?" ''Wall" said the moun- 
taineer, in reply, "I was a thinkin^ what a great preacher you'd 
a made if you jist had grace." Just so, these word artists, 
who played billiards with the stars, had plenty of grey matter 
in their heads, but very little white matter in their souls. But 
few of them had much talent for piety, as the French express 
it, but be it said to their credit, they all reverenced religion 
and the Bible, and in their way were preachers of righteous- 
ness. As for the hill-billie and his leaning to "grace" as well 
as to oratory, as a type of the period he could have been multi- 
plied by thousands, in all sections of the commonwealth of the 
Dark and Bloody Ground. Plain common men, so fired by 
the vision and passion for the union of great ideas and living 
words, that they would walk miles over rough roads in the 
dead of winter or heat of summer, and listen with engrossing 
attention for hours, to great speeches in the court house, or 



The Campbell-Rice Debate 183 

flaming sermons in the pulpits of neighboring churches. They 
named their children after these heroes of hustings, forums 
and pulpits, remembered their great efforts, talked of them to 
their children, often with tears in their eyes, as long as they 
had breath to talk of anything. If the intellectuals had failed 
to fill up the seats in the old Main St. Church in the blue 
grass capital, during the great debate, their places could 
have been supplied from neighboring farms, with men and 
women, who would have listened to the arguments, with the 
same absorbing attention and appreciation, all except the crit- 
icisms in foreign tongues. What an environing atmosphere 
was this for such a debate as that ! 



f 



CHAPTER XVIII 

THE CAMPBELL-RICE DEBATE: "MODE" AND 
"ACTION" OF BAPTISM 

Baptismal Dispute Still the Crux. More Time and Space 
and Propositions Devoted to It than All Other Subjects Put 
Together. 



PROPOSITION I. 

The immersion in water of a proper subject, into' the 
name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, is the 
one only apostolic or Christian baptism. 

Mr. Campbell affirms. 

Mr. Rice denies. 



CHAPTER XVIII 

THE CAMPBELL-RICE DEBATE: "MODE" AND "ACTION" 

OF BAPTISM 

THE sin and shame of the baptismal controversy finds its 
roots in the greater sin and crime of partisan blindness 
and sectarian dogmatism. In their blundering efforts to es- 
tablish theories and speculations of the Christian Religion, no 
subject, on which men have disputed, in the years of the past, 
has presented more abundant material, for accurate judgment 
and final settlement, than the meaning of the word, to ^^bap- 
tize/* If our theological dads and ecclesiastical forefathers 
could have approached the question in the temper and attitude 
of scientific students, in search of facts, and the truth of things, 
unclouded by creeds and preconceived opinions, and the choice 
of a place to land their boat before the voyage began — all of 
this inheritance of prejudice, ignorance, strife, and divided 
counsel would not have been dumped on the generations that 
followed them. 

A cursor}^ glance at the literature of the attempted solu- 
tions of the baptismal problem fills one with amazement, that 
so many factSj simple, clear, definite, and unmistakable in 
meaning and application, could ever have been the occasion 
of slight differences, much less of serious controversies. In 
this enormous book of 912 pages, 48 are devoted to corre- 
spondence and preliminaries; 549 to baptism; 147 to the Holy 
Spirit, and 153 to human creeds. Four propositions out of 
six, and two-thirds of the book, are taken up with the dif- 
ferent issues relating to baptism; and that is equivalent to 
saying that two-thirds of the time and space and labor, were 
consumed in the discussion of an external — the spiritual char- 

187 



188 Debates That Made History 

acter of the ordinance was not in dispute — certainly out of all 
proportion to its relative importance. There is some excuse 
for differences of opinion and interpretation on mystical ques- 
tions, like that of the Holy Spirit; and intellectual questions 
like that of creeds; but, on concrete questions of fact, and 
the specific meaning and application of the word to "bap- 
tize," where there is the least excuse for differences, contro- 
versy bulks the fiercest, largest and longest. This arises from 
that strange Adamic perversity of human nature, that is 
more concerned for the justification of its theories than it 
is for the vindication of truth, or the salvation of its soul. 

Mr. CampbelFs new opponent. Dr. N. L. Rice, makes all 
of this plain. He was the hardest man to handle of the 
five. The classic biographer of Mr. Campbell gives us the 
best account of the disputants and their methods in the dis- 
cussion of the first proposition, which was : 

The immersion in water of a proper subject in to the name of 
the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, is the only Apostolic or 
Christian Baptism. 

This question could and should have been settled in less 
space than the correspondence occupied, but was drawn out 
the longest. It lasted four days, and covered almost as much 
space, in the printed volume, as any two in the debate. He 
says that the difference in the intellectual character, and, con- 
sequently, in the method, of the two disputants become quite 
evident from the beginning. In the discussion of the very 
first proposition Mr. Campbell's tendency to comprehensive 
views, and his skill in disengaging the grand fundamental 
principles of things, became manifest in his endeavor to es- 
tablish the general law: ''Where words denote specific actions 
their derivatives, through all their various flexions and modifi- 
cations, retain the specific meaning of the root.'' This law he 
applied to the word bapto^ showing that its two thousand flex- 



"Mode" and "Action" of Baptism 189 

ions and modifications, in retaining the radical syllable bap, 
retained also the radical idea "dip" connected with it. Said 
he: 

The same holds good of its distant neighbor raino "I sprinkle." 

It has as many flexions and nearly as many derivatives as bapto 

These all exhibit the radical syllable rain or rani and with it the 
radical meaning, sprinkle. Now, as it is philologically impossible 
to find bap in rani or rain in bap so, impossible is it to find dip 
in sprinkle or sprinkle in dip. Hence the utter impossibility of 
either of these words representing both actions. It is difficult to 
conceive how any man of letters and proper reflection can, for a 
moment, suppose that bapto can ever mean sprinkle or raino, dip. 

Nor was his ready perception of the resemblance of re- 
lations less marked in the illustration he used in order to ren- 
der the point evident to the apprehension of his hearers. Re- 
ferring to the custom of the ancient grammarians to present 
verbs and their derivatives by a tree with its roots, stems and 
branches, he said: 

Agriculturists, horticlturists, botanists, will fully comprehend 
me when I say that in all the dominions of vegetable nature, un- 
touched by human art, as the root so is the stem, and so are all 
the branches. If the root be oak the stem cannot be ash nor the 
branches cedar. What would you think, Mr. President, of the 
sanity or veracity of a backwoodsman who would affirm that he 
found, in the state of nature, a tree whose root was of oak, whose 
stem was cherry, whose boughs were pear, and whose leaves were 
chestnut? If these grammarians and philologists have been happy in 
their analogies, drawn from the root and branches of trees to il- 
lustrate the derivation of words, how singularly fantastic the 
genius that creates a philogical tree whose root is bapto, whose stem 
is cheo, whose branches are rantizo and whose fruit is katharizo! — 
or, if not too ludicrous and preposterous for English ears, whose 
root is dip, whose trunk is pour, whose branches are sprinkle and 
whose fruit is purification! 

Mr. Campbell's opponent, on the other hand, manifested 
throughout that he moved in a very different sphere of thought, 
and was disposed to look at the subjects in their details, rather 
than in their general features. Hence, while Mr. Campbell 



190 Debates That Made History 

dealt in comprehensive rules, Mr. Rice occupied himself with 
exceptions. While the former sought to establish principles, 
the latter tried to overthrow them by burrowing beneath the 
basis on which they were erected. While the one enlarged 
the comprehension of his hearers, and illuminated every sub- 
ject that he touched, the efforts of the other served only to 
contract their understanding and to involve the subject in 
darkness and confusion. Thus his reply to the above argu- 
ment of Mr. Campbell was to deny the general rule asserted, 
and to adduce the words ''prevent'' and ''conversation,'' as 
having changed their original meaning, while retaining the 
radical syllables. Mr. Campbell stated, however, that these 
were words of generic, and not of specific import, and there- 
fore not legitimately within the rule, though, even in these, 
the radical syllable still retained its specific meaning. Mr. 
Rice affected also to rely greatly upon the fact that bapto and 
baptidzo were sometimes translated wash, and labored to make 
it appear that this was their primary meaning. But Mr. 
Campbell showed them to be so used by a metonymy of the 
effect for the cause, according to the well known general prin- 
ciples applying to all words. Mr. Rice affirming that the 
most reliable New Testament lexicons gave wash as the pri- 
mary meaning. This Mr. Campbell refuted, but, upon its 
being again and again reiterated, brought forward the cele- 
brated New Testament lexicon of Stokius who says of the 
word: 

1. Generally it obtains the sense of dipping Qr immersing with- 
out respect to water vor any liquid whatever. 

2. Specially, and in its proper signification, it signifies to dip or 
immerse in water. This is the New Testament sense. 

3. Topicall}^ and by a metalepsis, it means to wash, to cleanse, 
because a thing is usually dipped or immersed that it may be 
washed, that it may be cleansed. Its general sense is to dip. Its 
pioper sense to dip in water, its figurative sense, to wash, to cleanse. 



''Mode'' and ''Action' of Baptism 191 

Mr. Rice's confusion was such, upon this exposure, that he 
was quite unable to conceal it from the audience, and he, in 
vain, endeavored to escape from the dilemma by some evasive 
assertions in regard to tropes. He also endeavored to place 
Mr. Campbell in a similar position in reference to an asser- 
tion he had made that no translator, ancient or modern, ever 
rendered bapto or any of that family of words, to sprinkle. 
He brought up a passage (Rev. 19:13) which reads in the 
common version, ''He was clothed with a vesture dipped in 
blood,'' the Greek word for ''dipped," in every early manu- 
script known, being in this place bebammenon. Mr. Rice 
showed that in the ancient Syriac version the passage was 
rendered so as to read, in English, "He was clothed with a 
vesture sprinkled with blood." He adduced also the Vulgate, 
which rendered the passage in the same manner. In addition 
he adduced Origen, who, in quoting the passage almost ver- 
batim used rantizo instead of bapto. He further confirmed 
the correctness of the rendering sprinkle by referring to the 
sixty-third chapter of Isaiah, to which the passage, in ques- 
tion, evidently has relation, and where the conqueror says, 
"Their blood shall be sprinkled upon my garments." 

This, it must be confessed, seemed quite a strong case, but 
so firmly was Mr. Campbell persuaded that neither bapto nor 
its derivatives, could justly, in any case, be rendered sprinkle 
that he ventured to assert, what indeed had been formerly 
conjectured by Dr. Gale, that in this place, there must have 
been in the manuscript from which Origen quoted, and from 
which the Syriac version was made, a different reading (er- 
rantismenon instead of bebammenon^ which Jerome, the au- 
thor of the Vulgate, had adopted. Although no manuscript, 
then known, gave this reading, Mr. Campbell inferred that 
there must have been such a reading, from the fact that in 
all three translations adduced, it occurred in the same pas- 
sage, the last occurrence of the word in the book. The cor- 
responding passage in Isaiah also confirmed him in the opinion 



192 Debates That Made History 

that the idea of sprinkling had been derived from the language 
of the prophet by Origen and the version from which he 
quoted. He insisted, therefore, that with so much probability 
of a different reading, Mr. Rice was logically bound to show 
that the word hehammenon was actually in the manuscript 
quoted by Origen, as well as in the one from which the Syriac 
version was made. This being impossible, Mr. Rice's argu- 
ment was shown to be logically inconclusive. 

It was not, however, merely to refute his opponent's rea- 
soning that Mr. Campbell took this ground. In all his writ- 
ings and discussions he manifested that spirit of truthful in- 
vestigation which had guided him from the beginning. Mr. 
Rice, seemingly incapable of appreciating Mr. Campbell's posi- 
tion on the disputed passage, or of imitating the truth-loving 
spirit of investigation v»^hich it implied, continued, for some 
time, to make the most of the supposed discovery of an ex- 
ception to Mr. Campbell's universal rule and to bring up the 
matter again and again. Said he: 

Although Mr. Campbell has said and published that no trans- 
lator, ancient or modern, ever rendered any of this family or words 
to sprinkle, I have proved that the translators of the venerable 
Syriac, the Old Ethiopic and the Vulgate (all of whom, according 
to him, were immersionists) did so translate bapto. But he says 
^'There must have been a different reading." Where is the evi- 
dence? Is there any one copy of the New Testament found in all 
the searching for old manuscripts which presents a different read- 
irjg? There is not one! Why then, contend for a different reading? 
Simply because the claims of immersion demand it. 

Such was Mr. Rice's charitable estimate of his opponent's 
integrity that he supposed him capable of contending for a dif- 
ferent reading, not in the interest of truth, but merely ''because 
the claims of immersion demanded it." Providence, however, 
has already singularly verified the postulate assumed by Mr. 
Campbell, and exposed the fallacy through which ''sprinkle" 
was sought to be interpolated, as a proper or possible rendered 
of bapto. On the 4th of February, 1859, the learned Tis- 



"Mode' and "Action' of Baptism 193 

chendorf, who was engaged in Oriental researches, happened 
to be sojourning at the monastery of St. Catherine at Mount 
Sinai. Returning from a walk in company with the steward, 
the latter, upon reaching his chamber, placed before the trav- 
eller, for his examination, a basket of ancient manuscripts. 
Among these, to his surprise and delight, he found a complete 
copy of the New Testament on vellum, which proved to be 
one of the very oldest and most authentic manuscripts in 
the world, rivaling even the famous Codex Vaticanus. This 
precious apograph, published in 1865 by Tischendorf, gives 
the different reading in Rev. 19:13 that Mr. Campbell con- 
tended should be there, thus indicating, in a wonderful way, 
the soundness of his critical judgment and his intuitive sense 
of the harmony of truth. This vindication came twenty-two 
years after the debate, when Mr. Rice's hair was no longer 
black, and Mr. Campbell was an old man within one year 
of his translation into a sphere where, according to the great 
Dr. Parker, no controversialist can enter; but we are con- 
soled by the reflection that there are exceptions to all rules 
except that bapto never means to sprinkhj and raino never 
means to dip. 

It cannot be justly denied, our witness continues, that 
throughout the discussion, Mr. Rice manifested acuteness 
and ingenuity in bringing forward whatever could yield the 
slightest support to his cause, or that his efforts produced, 
occasionally, a marked impression on the audience. Having a 
musical voice and a pleasant countenance, with brilliant black 
eyes and hair, a confident and positive manner and an agonis- 
tic style of gesticulation, he was well fitted to command at- 
tention. Having also a large portion of the audience in 
favor of his propositions, he received from them numerous 
manifestations of sympathy and approval, which were sup- 
posed, by many, to have been even preconcerted for the pur- 
pose of manufacturing public opinion. If such were the pur- 



194 Debates That Made History 

pose of the actors in the case, there is not slightest evidence 
that Mr. Rice instigated such proceedings, though his manner 
and language, during the discussion, were plainly calculated to 
encourage manifestations of applause and merriment, which 
it was his duty to repress as especially unbecoming in the 
discussion of serious subjects. 

Mr. Rice's remarkable fluency of speech, superior talent 
for managing minute details, his consummate art in present- 
ing false issues, and evading the true ones, gave him great 
influence over the minds of those unskilled in the detection of 
fallacious reasoning. He seldom indeed appeared to rise to 
the dignity of the subject, and both his arguments and his 
expressions were often of an ad captandum character. The 
characteristic and worst features of his speeches, however, were 
the personal bearing and the hostile spirit which he imparted 
to them. He had scattered upon his table many volumes of 
Mr. Campbell's works, and seemed to take an especial pleasure 
in quoting and referring to his writings, so as to make him 
appear inconsistent or place him in an unfavorable light 
before the audience rather than in discussing the propositions 
upon their own merits. This course gave to the entire dis- 
cussion a certain degree of asperity and acrimony, and fos- 
tered, on the part of the audience personal and denominational 
feelings and prejudices. 

These feelings ran very high at times, and gave rise to 
amusing incidents. Two ladies in the gallery were earnestly 
engaged in maintaining the merits of their respective dis- 
putants. ''Ah," said one of them to the other as a closing 
and convincing argument, "you can easily see that Mr. Rice 
is by far the most learned man. Just see how many books 
he has on his table, while Mr. Campbell has hardly any.'' 
''But you don't appear to know," retorted the other, "that the 
books on Mr. Rice's table were written by Mr. Campbell." 



''Mode'' and ''Action' of Baptism 195 

On another occasion, after dismission, a Mr. Irwin of Madi- 
son County, a warm friend of Mr. Campbell, was complain- 
ing of poor health, and remarked that he had not eaten any- 
thing for a number of days. ''Ah," said Col. Speed Smith, 
jocularly, ''you have been feeding on camel (Campbell).'^ 
"Not so," said the Presbyterian preacher, Mr. Brown, who 
was also from Madison, "I believe he has been living on 
rice (Rice) during these days." "If so," rejoined Col. 
Smith, "he has been living on extremely light diet." 



ii 



CHAPTER XIX 

THE CAMPBELL-RICE DEBATE: PURPOSE OF 

BAPTISM 

Infant Affusion and Baptism for the Remission of Sins. 
Some Interesting Points of History and Argument Connected 
with Both Subjects. 



PROPOSITIONS II, III, IV. 

2. The infant of a believing parent is a scriptural 
subject of baptism. Mr. Rice affirms. Mr. Campbell 
denies. 

3. Christian baptism is for the remission of past sins. 
Mr. Campbell affirms. Mr. Rice denies. 

4. Baptism is to be administered only by a bishop 
or ordained presbyter. Mr. Rice affirms. Mr. Camp- 
bell denies. 



« 



CHAPTER XIX 
THE CAMPBELL-RICE DEBATE: PURPOSE OF BAPTISM 

THE debate on the action or mode of baptism, noticed 
briefly in the last chapter, was the most exhaustive and 
scholarly in the history of the baptismal controversy. It was 
the decisive battle of the war on the meaning of the Greek 
word to baptize. Of course there were many hotly contested 
engagements in subsequent years, as in the case of the Great 
World War, after the decisive battle of the Marne. It al- 
ways requires time, after a great decision has been registered, 
to beat down into the consciousness of the opposition, the fact 
of its overthrow. No educated person, with even a minimum 
of knowledge on the subject, any longer appeals to the New 
Testament as authority for the practice of sprinkling and 
pouring as permissible forms of administering the ordinance 
of Christian baptism. 

Those who continue the practice of sprinkling and pouring 
do so on the claim that the church had a right, under the 
circumstances, on the score of convenience, to change the 
form; or, on the well worn assumption expressed by Dean 
Stanley, that the change from immersion to affusion was the 
triumph of sanctified common sense, over bondage to form and 
custom. This assertion of the learned Dean, however, ap- 
pearing to raise a new question, merely throws us back on the 
old issue of human authority in religion, and the right of 
man to change divine ordinances, or to exercise legislative 
functions in the kingdom of God. The New Testament 
settles that point, quite as effectually, as it does the original 
question of the form of Christian baptism, and it is good sanc- 
tified common sense, into the bargain, as we shall see, when 
we come to a word on the significance of religious forms in 
the Christian system. 

199 



200 Debates That Made History 

In the proposition affirming the divine origin of infant 
baptism, there is nothing of particular interest, not already 
noticed, except, Mr. Rice's repudiation of one of the main 
pillars on which the practice in question had chiefly rested 
in previous debates; the doctrine that baptism had come in 
the room of circumcision, which was to say, as male infants 
born into the religio-political commonwealth of Israel, had the 
national and racial sign of circumcision placed upon them, all 
infants born of Christian parents, whether male or female, 
had a right to baptism, the sign and seal of the new covenant 
in Christ. In the debate with McCalla, twenty years before, 
we called attention to the quite unusual phenomenon that Mr. 
Campbell had so effectively shattered the timbers of this argu- 
mentative structure that no effort had ever been made to 
rebuild it, except by some incautious fellow, who had not kept 
up with the history of the discussion. If the reader will par- 
don a personal reference, as speakers and writers always say, 
when they are going to say too much about themselves, I once 
had an experience with a twofold significance in its relation 
to this incident of the great debate. 

Quite a number of years ago, in the verdant days when I 
was always ready for *'spute," in the Temperance Hall, Mel- 
bourne, Australia, I held a five nights* debate with a Metho- 
dist minister named Butchers, on the usual baptismal issues 
between our paedobaptist brethren and ourselves. I had en- 
gaged in a previous written discussion with him in my paper, 
The Australian Christian Watchman and the Wesleyan Con- 
nectional organ. The Spectator, published in the same city, in 
which he attempted to build the bridge of infant baptism on 
two pillars, as he expressed it; the identity of the covenants 
and of baptism in the room of circumcision. I blew up those 
pillars with gun-cotton, obtained from Mr. Campbell in the 
debate with McCalla; expecting, of course, that Mr. Butchers 
would attempt their reconstruction in the oral debate, soon to 
follow. 



Purpose of Baptism 201 

In preparing for this final tilt to be taken down and pub- 
lished in book form, I packed in a bigger charge than before 
and was lying in wait, itching for a chance to blast those 
pillars, especially the circumcision pillar, the easier one to de- 
molish. Fancy, if you can, my surprise and utter disgust, 
when my opponent coolly and with sinful deliberation, and 
apparently without consciousness of inconsistency, as against 
his past record, repudiated his circumcision pillar, said as he 
did not need it, that he would make me a present of it, and 
proceeded, as though nothing had happened, to swing his 
bridge on one pillar, the identity of the covenants, which 
meant, as you understand, that the old Jewish commonwealth, 
under Moses, was the same institution as the Christian Church 
established by the Holy Spirit in the Apostles. I knew at 
once what had happened. This is what Rice had done. The 
next evening, as w^e sat in a little room back of the platform, 
chatting with the chairman, in waiting for the discussion to 
begin, I said. 

Brother Butchers, I perceive, sir, that you have been feeding on 
rice (Rice) of late. 

It was a center shot which threw him into a great state of 
confusion : he blushed crimson red up to the roots of his dark 
hair, stammered out something that was not intelligible; but 
in a moment or two, he recovered himself sufficiently to say: 

Well, yes, I sent to England for the Campbell and Rice debate, 
and it arrived only ten days ago, just in time for a hasty reading 
of the discussion on baptism. 

I I'eplied: 

I will not give you away, Bro. Butchers. I will not tell on you, 
but I will take the liberty of making a suggestion. Instead of ap- 
pealing to the scriptures for authority and evidence to justify sprink- 
ling as a mode of baptism, and infant affusion as a divine ordinance, 
where these doctrines are not found, as you well know, why don't 
you fall back on Dean Stanley to justify the change from immersion 
to affusion and on Henry Ward Beecher's ox yoke argument to 
vindicate the practice of infant baptism? This would put the two 



202 Debates That Made History 

institutions on a pragmatic basis, and we are living in an age 
dominated by the pragmatic philosophy. It would be much easier 
to meet the attacks of your opponents, whereas when you claim 
biblical authorization for these practices, any Sunday school teacher 
of ordinary intelligence, as a mere breakfast spell, can overthrow 
the greatest scholar in the Methodist church. 

He did not adopt my suggestion, and I was glad of it, for 
the obvious reason already assigned. This incident illustrates, 
in another direction. The munitions of war, all the bullets 
fired and all the powder to fire them, and all the bayonets 
that glittered on many a bloodless field of glory, clear down to 
the end of the polemic era, and throughout the entire English 
speaking world, were chiefly drawn from the factory set up 
by Messrs. Campbell and Rice in Lexington, Kentucky, in the 
year of our Lord, 1843. All the material is here, nothing 
has been added since, little has been altered, nothing has been 
better said, the seal of historic finality is still unbroken. 

The third proposition in the baptismal series, viz., ''Christian 
Baptism is for the remission of past sins,'* Mr. Campbell re- 
garded as of more vital importance than any of the others, 
because of the meaning of the ordinance and its relation to sal- 
vation. His first speech of an hour in length, was a written 
composition, a little too excursive and comprehensive for the 
best immediate effect in public discussion in the presence of 
a mixed audience. It was in this particular that Mr. Rice was 
always at his best. His language was simple and clear, his 
thought superficial, he never soared so high nor delved so deep, 
nor traveled so far afield that the people could not easily 
follow him, and, beyond all this, he had a saving sense of 
humor, which Mr. Campbell possessed also, but would not 
use in the discussion of serious, and solemn questions of our 
holy religion. 

The distinctive feature, however, of this first address was 
a majestic and telling array of proof texts, alleging in plain 
and untwistible words the connection of baptism and the re- 
mission of sins. His key passage, it goes without saying, was 



Purpose of Baptism 203 

Acts 2 :38, '^Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the 
name of Jesus Christ, for the remission of sins/* He did not 
fail, of course, to point out that the Greek and Latin church 
fathers, scholars of the middle ages as well as modern scholars, 
and all the historic creeds of Christendom, including the 
Westminster Confession of faith, the one Mr. Rice was-^ 
solemnly pledged to maintain, one and all, taught in terms 
explicit and unmistakable, the historic and catholic doctrine 
of baptism for the remission of sins. The only question re- 
maining was the meaning of remission and its association with 
baptism as an ordinance of religion. 

Mr. Rice's reply to this first long speech was characteristic 
of him in more ways than one. He first sought a specific 
understanding, so he claimed, of the exact issue involved, and 
he did this, not by attending to the definitions and qualifi- 
cations of his position, just stated by his opponent, but by 
going back to Mr. Campbell's first book, Christianity Restored, 
and to his first paper the Christian Baptist, reading long ex- 
tracts from each, in which he found, at least, one of those 
unfortunate statements made by Mr. Campbell in the moil 
and heat of the early days of the baptismal dispute. Mr. 
Rice found exactly what he was looking for in the declaration 
that the post-apostolic fathers and scholars of the church used 
immersion as the exact equivalent of regeneration, using 
another word to express the spiritual element that made the 
change, at the beginning of the regenerate life. From this 
and a few other statements of the same kind he deduced the 
conclusion that his opponent taught the absolute and literal es- 
sentiality of immersion in water in order to the remission of 
past sins, the crassest form of the odious doctrine of baptismal 
regeneration; from which another harrowing deduction fol- 
lowed. A man, for instance, who was converted on the first 
day of the month and had to wait till the 31st to be baptized, 
would have to wait thirty days for pardon and salvation and. 



204 Debates That Made History 

if he should chance to die before the expiration of the time, he 
would go unpardoned and be lost! 

He then proceeded to file objections to a doctrine involving 
such horrific and intolerable consequences. He collated, com- 
piled and brought into view all of that numerous class of 
passages which ascribe salvation and justification to faith. 
He then said, by way of application, *'If these passages, from 
the Word of God are true, Mr. Campbell's construction of 
Acts 2:38 is false and his whole line of defense broken in the 
center." As a very obvious matter, of course, Mr. Campbell 
believed these scriptures cited by Mr. Rice, and had brought 
them all into a perfectly consistent relation to his interpre- 
tation of the central passage in dispute. At this point Mr. 
Rice asked the chairman how much time he had, ^'Fifteen 
minutes*' said Mr. Clay. He had spoken 45 minutes without 
attempting to answer anything Mr. Campbell had said in his 
opening address. 

He then paid a brief visit to Jerusalem and the day of Pen- 
tecost and took a side glance at the threatening passage that 
blocked and bisected his path of travel. He brought up Matt. 
3:11 to oifset the pentecostal stronghold of his opponent: *'I 
indeed baptize you in water (et?) unto repentance.*' **Now," 
said Mr. Rice, "will my friend maintain that John baptized 
the Jews in order that they might repent — to cause them to 
repent of their sins! If he will not, how can he maintain that 
Peter commanded baptism in order to the remission of sins? 
The mode of expression in both cases is precisely the 
same." Yes, the two constructions are one; they are ex- 
actly alike. Candidly, it began to look as if this assault of 
the enemy might compel Mr. Campbell to surrender his Mal- 
ikoff in Acts 2:38. But the God of criticism and prophecy 
seemed always to be on the side of Bethany. 

Quite recently a classmate of mine, in the old College of 
the Bible, at Lexington, nearly fifty years ago, said to me, and 
he laughed when he said it, "Do you suppose that McGarvey 



I 



Purpose of Baptism 205 

continued to the end to teach his students that John baptized 
those Jews in the wilderness in order that they might repent 
to save Acts 2:38 to the cause of primitive Christianity?" Of 
course, I could not answer his question, although I distinctly 
recalled the fact that he was not misrepresenting the teaching 
in those days of our much esteemed professor. Shortly after 
this conversation I opened into the Twentieth Century New 
Testament, and I did again before beginning to write this 
sentence and, wonderful to relate, found that time once more 
had vindicated Alexander Campbell as it has so often done 
before in these studies. This scholarly translation into Eng- 
lish ''as she is spoke,'' notwithstanding the similarity of these 
parallel constructions in Greek, does not render them the 
same in English. Matt. 3:11 is rendered, *'I indeed baptize 
you with water to teach repentance." Acts 2:38 is rendered, 
''Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the faith of 
Jesus Christ, for the forgiveness of your sins: and then you 
will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit." The first rendering 
throws a world of light on immersion, and the necessity of 
its preservation, in terms of its spiritual and ethical evaluation. 
There were two teachers of the clean life of righteousness at 
the time of John's administration in the wilderness, the person- 
ality of the harbinger, and his baptism in water. Verbal 
preaching that reached the soul through the ear, and symbolic 
teaching that reached the mind through the eye. An ordi- 
nance of religion is a method, and the best method of impart- 
ing and impressing the fundamental truths of the religious 
life. Immersion, as a sacrament of faith, signifies the clean 
life of spiritual character. The Lord's Supper means the 
sacrificial life of spiritual service. These two make up the 
essentials, yes, the vitals of the Christian religion. 

It appeared to superficial people, then as now, that these 
two giants were wasting their time and strength and causing 
a lot of trouble in disputing over a mere form. But it was 



206 Debates That Made History 

not a mere form. The religion of Jesus knows nothing of 
mere forms. While the question of material form was the 
least of its characteristic features, it was a teacher of vital 
religion in which form was as much a necessity as a body is 
to a soul in the present stage of human existence. To make 
the change from immersion to sprinkling or pouring or a 
slight moistening with the touch of finger balls, almost as 
dry as the prohibition amendment to the constitution of the 
United States is in our day, means the total destruction of 
both the symbolism and the psychology, and hence the testify- 
ing and teaching functions of Christian baptism. 

When Mr. Campbell referred to his old statement, brought 
up by Mr. Rice, that immersion and regeneration were inter- 
changeable terms, he made it plain that his meaning, all the 
time, had been, not that immersion was regeneration, but that 
immersion was the symbol of regeneration, the plain and ob- 
vious truth of the matter. To make his meaning plain in this 
connection he quoted the Westminster Confession to the effect 
that ''baptism was the outward sign of an inward grace,** and, 
giving it his unqualified endorsement, said, ''My friend, Mr. 
Rice, who pledged in his ordination vows to preach and main- 
tain this conception of baptism, does not appear in this dis- 
cussion to believe one word of it." 

The representation of Mr. Campbell as teaching the abso- 
lute and literal and universal indispensability of water baptism, 
in order to the remission of sins, he meets by a parallel in- 
stance applied to his opponent. Mr. Rice believed that the 
Bible was essential to the salvation of the heathen world. But 
the Bible, literally and from a materialistic point of view, is 
made of rags, oil, and lamp-black. Now, suppose, said he — 
I am not quoting his words, but the substance of what he said 
— that I go out and circulate the report that the Rev. N. L. 
Rice of the Presbyterian church teaches and believes that rags, 
oil, and lamp-black are essential to the salvation of the 
heathen. Of course it would be understood that these things 



Purpose of Baptism 207 

were the material elements, through which the message of 
life was made known to the lost souls of heathen men and 
women. The application was easy to make that water per- 
formed a similar office in religion as the physical element 
through which the message of truth and life and the assurance 
of forgiveness, was conveyed to the souls of men. 

The way Mr. Rice answered Mr. Campbell's illustration 
comes near convicting him of the charge of Moses E. Lard, 
that he was ^^tricky and unprincipled," if not something worse. 
He said: ^^The pagans, he seems to think, are sent to hell, 
for a very small matter, only because they have not rags, oil, 
and lamp-black! I had supposed, that they were pretty well 
furnished with rags, and perhaps with oil and lamp-black. 
I have never heard any complaint on that score (a laugh) . But 
if the gentlemen says they have not, I have nothing to say 
(continued laughter) if he chooses to represent the Bible as 
only rags, lamp-black and oil, let him do so. The pagans, 
however, are responsible only for the light they have.'' Mr. 
Campbell deplored the irreverence, levity, flippant trifling 
with a solemn subject — not to mention the shocking dishonesty 
of the misrepresentation, and then proceeded with his argu- 
ment. 



I 



CHAPTER XX 

THE CAMPBELL-RICE DEBATE: THE HOLY 

SPIRIT 

The Operation of the Holy Spirit in Conversion and Sane- 
tification. Another Great Speech by Mr, Campbell, Henry 
Clay Captivated by its Eloquence and Power. The Little 
Adverb ''Only'' the Biggest Word in the Proposition. 



PROPOSITION V, 

In conversion and sanctification, the Spirit of God 
operates on persons only through the word of truth. 

Mr. Campbell affirms. 
Mr. Rice denies. 



CHAPTER XX 

jl THE CAMPBELL-RICE DEBATE: THE HOLY SPIRIT 

THE opening address of Mr. Campbell on the affirmative 
of the proposition that "In conversion and sanctification 
the Spirit of God operates on persons only through the Word/* 
W3is a club of Hercules entwined vrith flowers. For rhetor- 
ical sublimity, literary finish, beauty and brilliancy of diction, 
to say nothing of the effort, as an argumentative thunderbolt, 
it equalled, if it did not surpass, the greatest efforts of Daniel 
Webster, Patrick Henry, John Quincy Adams, or Wendell 
Phillips, in a different field. Dr. Richardson says of this 
address, "It has been greatly and deservedly admired for its 
beauty of diction, its clearness of statement, and its power of 
argument.'* He describes the effect it produced on the mind 
of Henry Clay, who himself was one of the supreme spell- 
binders of all time. Said Dr. Richardson: 

It was remarked that Henry Clay, who had been very careful to 
avoid, previously, the slightest appearance of favoring either dis- 
putant, was so captivated by it as, for a time, to forget himself. A 
gentleman, well acquainted with him, noticed soon after Mr. Camp- 
bell began that he became unusually attentive and, as the subject 
became unfolded and successive arguments were presented, that he 
leaned forward and began to bow assent, waving his hand, at the 
same time, in that graceful, approving manner peculiar to him. 
While the gentleman was observing this, with some surprise, as 
he never before, except upon one occasion, had found Mr. Clay 
to be so carried away by a public speaker, the latter, suddenly recol- 
lecting himself, drew himself back and looked to see if any one 
had noticed him thus off his guard. 

A high dignitary, in the Episcopal church, writing, soon 
after in The Protestant Churchman, thus spoke of it and of 
the disputants: 

211 






212 Debates That Made History ; 

With the exception of a few unguarded expressions, and that 
he affirms a universal, where only a general can be proved, Mr. 
CampbelPs affirmative argument, on the point that "The Holy 
Spirit in conversion and sanctification operates only through the 
word" is one of the most splendid specimens of eloquent reasoning 
I ever remember to have read. So, also apply to over expanded 
creeds — the Westminster Confession, for instance — ^what he reck- 
lessly charges upon all creeds, and more thrilling or magnificent 
declamation can hardly anywhere be found than that interwoven 
in the closing debate. 

After referring to other specimens of Mr. CampbelFs lofty 
and powerful argumentation he adds: 

Mr. Rice is wholly incapable of this sort of thing. His imagi- 
nation is as barren as the surface of granite. 

After preliminary definitions, and observations, Mr. Camp- 
bell argued his proposition from the plain and positive state- 
ments of Holy Scripture, the constitution of the human mind, 
and the well-know^n laws of mental and moral communication. 
This Episcopalian writer accuses him of introducing a uni- 
versal where only a general can be proved. Is that a fact? 
Mr. Rice joined in the accusation and declared that Mr. 
CampbelFs theory of spiritual influence limited the power of 
God, without a corresponding limitation on the deviFs modus 
operandi, who could communicate by direct impact and with- 
out the use of means. Supposed analogies of this character, 
however, fall many leagues short of proving that the infinite 
can enter into communication with the finite without, neces- 
sarily, limiting himself. 

Our modern psychology teaches us that neither God nor the 
devil, nor any other outside personality, can put ideas or 
knowledge into the mind without the use of medial instru- 
mentalities. Words are the vehicle of ideas and ideas are 
the vehicles of life, and I should like to see mental, moral or 
spiritual life conveyed, from one personality to another, with- 
out the medium of words or material signs that represent 
words. I am not nearly so sure that Mr. Campbell made a 



The Holy Spirit 213 

mistake, when he put the word "only" into his proposition, 
as I was five years ago, when I wrote the following paragraph 
in my little work on the "Markers and Moulders of the Ref- 
ormation Movements*': 

Mr. Campbell, in his great debate with N. L. Rice at Lexington, 
Kentucky, in 1843, on the subject of spiritual influence, affirmed 
this proposition: "The Holy Spirit, in conversion and sanctification, 
operates only through the Truth." The argument in support of 
this thesis is perhaps the most eloquent to be found in the literature 
of the Spirit's relation to saint and sinner, but it fails to carry 
conviction to the religious mind of today. Mr. Rice agreed with 
Mr. Campbell that the spirit operated through the truth, but denied 
that it operated through the truth only. He said, in his criticism 
of the adverb in the proposition, "If the Holy Spirit operates through 
the truth only, why does Mr. Campbell pray for the conversion of 
sinners?" Why not preach the word and leave the truth to do its 
work without the invocation of an influence outside of both? If 
the affirmation is true, said the Presbyterian Divine, that the Spirit 
is shut up to the word of truth, the devil is more resourceful and 
powerful than God, for he reaches the minds of men without the 
intervention of words. Mr. Campbell did not answer these points, 
but the Disciples for more than a generation have answered them 
by the elimination of the word "only." 

I said further on the same page: 

Our people have been among the first to learn that the principal, 
though not the exclusive channel, of the Spirit's operation in con- 
version and sanctification, is the personality of regenerated and con- 
secrated men and women. The circulation of the inspired word, 
in heathen lands, makes few, if any, converts until Word and 
Spirit find the opportunity of incarnation and holy character, in 
the missionary, who carries to the dark lands of the earth, the 
message of salvation. 

This last statement is true enough, but the other conclu- 
sion was hasty and is not sustained by the facts. 

A careful and critical re-reading of the discussion has con- 
vinced me that Mr. Campbell made no mistake in the use of 
the word "only/' The two points about praying for the con- 
version of sinners, and the deviFs abstract and mystical oper- 



214 Debates That Made History 

ations in carrying on his work, needed no answer, because 
all such objections had been forestalled by the definitions and 
qualifications of Mr. Campbeirs first address, to which, as 
usual, Mr. Rice paid no attention. He preferred dodging the 
real issue, in artful attempts to create false ones, by reading 
long irrelevant extracts from Mr. CampbelFs books, written 
twenty years before, and treating of other aspects of the theme 
in hand. In reply to the charge that he ^'limited the power 
of God,'' Mr. Campbell said, 

I do limit the power of God, because he himself has limited 
Jt * * * The Universalian accuses Mr. Rice of limiting the 
power of God because he makes salvation depend upon faith and 
a holy life. When Mr. Rice defends himself from that charge his 
defence shall be mine from his charge of limitation. 

In his second address he said: 

I believe God presides over all the works of his hands. But that 
is not the point of debate; nor is it the question about what God 
can or cannot do — whether, or not, he turns the hearts of things 
and mortals as the channels of the rivers or seas are turned. 
Whether he disposes the hearts of men without words, is not the 
question ; for were it proved that he can move kings and princes, 
and men of all ranks and degrees, as I believe, without the Bible 
and without words, that reaches not this issue at all. The question 
before us is about conversion and sanctification. The question is 
whether God converts men to Christ or sanctifies Christians, fwithout 
the truth of the Bible. 

There is not a case on record known to us, and if celestial 
wisdom and earthly common sense and the laws of intercourse 
and communion between mind and mind, count for anything, 
there is never likely to be one. 

But why debate insoluble questions of mystery and miracle, 
concerning which we know little and comprehend less ? Why 
not leave the Holy Spirit to operate in his own way, as he will 
do and must do, in any event? This resembles a contem- 
poraneous quarrel as to the priority of faith or repentance 
in the conversion of sinners. When a generation of orthodox 



The Holy Spirit 215 

zealots had wasted much of God's precious time and their 
own feeble strength in a dispute as to whether faith preceded 
repentance, or repentance faith, in the mental and moral proc- 
esses of conversion, they woke up, one fine morning, to the 
consciousness of enough sense to realize that if men believed 
and repented at all, they must believe and repent in the right 
way. The Spirit of God must choose the modes of his own 
activity, and when he moves, although in "a mysterious way 
his wonders to perform," it will be the right way, the way 
that chords with the constitution of the universe, and his own 
constitution as well. 

But there was a method in Mr. Campbell's madness, when 
he introduced the limiting adverb into the proposition on the 
operations of the Holy Spirit. It was not to limit the power 
of God. It was to limit the errors, ignorances, and super- 
stitions of men, who, by their traditions, theories and wild 
speculations had made void the Word of God. Mr. Rice 
was keenly alive to the fact that defeat, on this proposition, 
spelled the doom of his precious Calvinism. The center of 
his battle line was the old Calvinistic dogma of hereditary 
total depravity, man's absolute inability to think a good 
thought, or do a good deed, to believe, repent or receive the 
gospel, till this abstract impact and miraculous power of the 
Holy Spirit, had communicated resurrection life to the dead 
soul, after which it could hear, understand, believe, and be 
converted. 

This theological and inhuman concept of current Calvin- 
ism hung like a pall of midnight darkness over the minds of 
men, creating the delusion that they were unable to repent 
without a special abstract visitation of miraculous power, 
which, if it never came, left them without responsibility, in 
the matter of their own salvation. This blighting heresy of 
Calvinism went the length of teaching that infants were re- 
generated by the abstract influence of the Holy Spirit and 
Mr. Rice went the extreme limit of all that was absurd and 



216 Debates That Made History 

unintelligent in the assertion that John the Baptist was thus 
regenerated before he was born. This senseless and impos- 
sible notion, farther back in the history of the church, became 
the basis of the preposterous heresy of baptismal regeneration. 
This doctrine of miraculous regeneration by direct impact and 
contact of the Holy Spirit before man could believe, repent, or 
be held responsible for his sins, was the crux of Mr. Rice's 
position, and practically in this crisis of American Christi- 
anity, the greatest conceivable hindrance to the progress of 
the gospel of our divine Lord. 

It was this fact that drove Barton W. Stone out of Presby- 
terian Calvinism into the universality of the love of God and 
the atonement of Jesus Christ as these sublime truths were 
taught in the New Testament. All of the Stone and Campbell 
preachers of those early days always occupied the first half 
of their sermons in a systematic and thorough going refutation 
of Calvinism. Racoon John Smith used to say, when he 
preached two hours as he often did, that he spent the first 
hour in "clearing the ground" as he expressed it, that is in 
refuting and overturning the obstructive and destructive 
theories of Calvin's theology, then the dominant faith of the 
country, from which he had just been delivered by Alexander 
Campbell. I once heard a Methodist preacher pray, "Lord, 
come into the lumber rooms of our hearts and brush out the 
cobwebs." Our early preachers of the New Testament 
evangel, found it necessary with a mighty gospel broom in 
hand, to invade the "lumber rooms" of our sanctuaries to 
sweep out the "cobwebs" of Calvinian metaphysics and kin- 
dred accumulations, before it was possible to get enough light 
and truth in to do the saving work they had in view. Mr. 
Campbell speaks of the practical consequences of the brand 
of teaching he seeks to overthrow in this debate. He said : 

I believe not only in the Holy Spirit, but in a religion of which 
this divine agent is both the substance, origin, cause, and reason. 
But sir, in my humble opinion, this metaphysical abstraction, this 
theological speculation, this electric immedial operation that makes 



The Holy Spirit 217 

an infant or a pagan holy in a moment, has been the most soul ruin- 
ing dogma ever invented, preached or propagated. It has slain its 
tens of thousands. It has made skeptics, fanatics, despondents, and 
visionaries, without number and without limit. 

And he went on to say in scorching words, but none too 
scorching, 

These elect infants, elect pagans, elect idiots, on whom God 
acts when, where and how he pleases, but makes them holy in a 
moment, without light, knowledge, faith, or love, are figments of 
distempered brains, the creatures of religious romance, the offspring 
of a metaphysical delusion, for which there is no cure, but in the 
rational reading and study of the book of God. 

It is a matter of common knowledge that this theory of 
spiritual influence, in its practical workings, played "high 
jinks" with emotional and temperamental folk. Mr. Camp- 
bell cites a well authenticated instance of a woman who, in 
reciting her "experience,'' declared that "The Holy Spirit 
went through me from head to foot, bursting off the nails 
from my fingers and toes." It was to eliminate this vulgar 
mysticism, with its gruesome and ridiculous manifestations, 
and to open way for the sane and simple gospel of the power 
of God, that Mr. Campbell inserted the little qualifier "only" 
in his affirmation. It was by all odds the biggest and most 
significant word in the proposition. Without it there would 
have been no affirmative for Mr. Campbell and no negative 
for Mr. Rice, no difference between the disputants, and no 
debate on the Holy Spirit. 

The stars in their courses seemed always to be fighting for 
this man Campbell, who was the arch heretic of his day. The 
time element involved has vindicated him absolutely in all 
his fundamental contentions. Even the psychic and pneu- 
matic phenomena, so much in vogue just now, with its scien- 
tific appraisal and demonstration, brings messages across the 
line, and puts them into the minds of men in the flesh, in the 
same old way of super-mundane revelations at the beginning. 
Vague impressions may be made by the naked impact of spirit, 



218 Debates That Made History 

but intelligible ideas, and definite knowledge, use the old 
vehicular and medial agencies employed by men who com- 
municate with each other in the body. Our wireless messages 
skip through space along rhythmic waves of ether. These 
messages contain ideas expressed in words that find material 
record and transmission at the near end of the line. Ether 
is matter, like all other physical substances, only finer and 
more attenuated in quality. The soul is ethereal and hence 
the scientific demonstration of the indestructibility of matter 
{?. also the scientific demonstration of the immortality of the 
soul. If there is such a thing as the literal impact of spirit 
upon spirit the elements of materiality and instrumentality 
would necessarily enter into the account and then what would 
become of the metaphysical abstraction of Mr. Rice's propo- 
sition ? 

Victory or defeat in debate is not decided by the hotly 
expressed opinions of partizans on either side. Wait till the 
clash and crash of battle has been silenced by time and the 
smoke and grime of conflict cleared away, and people have 
had time to pull themselves together, and to do a little think- 
ing; then '^look 'round you'' and take account of what has 
happened. 

In a quarter of a century after this debate, an agitation for 
the revision of the Westminster Confession of Faith sprang 
up in brainy Scotland, and quickly spread to the rest of the 
English speaking world. After a decade or so of bitter dis- 
cussion with enough crimination and recrimination to dis- 
credit all the creeds of Christendom, the reactionaries of the 
Kirk gave way in confusion, and the army of revision took 
possession of the field. The method adopted was not by mod- 
ification nor abolition of the old historic formulary, but by 
substitution and contradiction. They inserted a new creed, 
w^hich they tacked on to the old one without any effort to 
bridge the two documents into any kind of logical or moral 
relationship to each other. The practical effect of this abro- 



The Holy Spirit 219 

gation of the codified, certificated doctrines of hereditary total 
depravity, abstract spiritual influence, particular grace, limited 
atonement, election and reprobation, was a complete vindica- 
tion and an unqualified endorsement of Alexander CampbelFs 
position in his debate with Rice. The whole Presbyterian 
communion, in its capacity as a gospel preaching brotherhood, 
came over in a body to the Stone and Campbell interpretation 
of the universality of the atonement, the love of God, the 
ability and responsibility of man, and the proclamation of the 
gospel as the power of God for salvation to all who believe. 
This was a victory sure enough, gained under the most trying 
conditions of prejudice and persecution, the greatest triumph 
of the series, except the next and last one on human creeds. 



CHAPTER XXI 

THE CAMPBELL-RICE DEBATE: HUMAN 
CREEDS AND CHRISTIAN UNION 

The Last Proposition of the Campbell and Rice Debate, and 
the Most Important. 



PROPOSITION VI. 

Human creeds, as bonds of union and communion, 
are necessarily heretical and schismatical. 

Mr. Campbell affirms. 
Mr. Rice denies. 



CHAPTER XXI 

THE CAMPBELL-RICE DEBATE: HUMAN CREEDS AND 
CHRISTIAN UNION 

FROM the superficial point of view of ^lookers on in 
Venice" and others, who might and should have known 
better, it appeared that Mr. Campbell had no advantage over 
his opponent in the discussion of creeds and their bearings on 
the vital and all important question of the union of Christians. 
Dr. Richardson says of Mr. Rice in this part of the debate: 

Ingeniously availing himself of the cases in which considerable 
difference of sentiment had been tolerated among the Reformers, 
and of Mr. Campbell's candor in acknowledging, occasionally in 
his writings, the existing deficiencies amongst his brethren, he 
managed, by exaggerating these, and by means of incorrect state- 
ments, imaginary cases, and feigned issues, to create, for a time, 
the impression upon some, even who had been opposed to creeds, 
that they were, by no means, so injurious or unnecessary as had 
been supposed. 

It was further remarked that Rice, in his attempt to excite 
religious fears and prejudices upon this subject, was greatly 
aided by the circumstance that Mr. Campbell's view of the 
true grounds of Christian Union was so far in advance of the 
age as not to be yet really and fully understood by the com- 
munity in general. 

The chief purpose of our champion of reformation, in this 
discussion of creeds, was unification. This was a war to end 
war by removing the causes of war. The upas tree of the 
sectarian blight, found its tap root in the poison of an intel- 
lectualism, that grew above ground in the form of opinionative 
and divisive secretarian creeds. This tree had to be pulled 
bodily out of the ground, and the earth sweetened by the love 
of God in Christ Jesus our Lord, before it could be made to 

223 



224 Debates That Made History 

bear the fruit of the spirit. Mr. Campbell lost no opportu- 
nity to present the basic principles of the Christian union plea 
he was making before the world. He took occasion early 
in the discussion of the creed proposition to say 

We all see that Christendom is at present in an agitated, dis- 
located condition — cut up, or frittered down, into sects and parties 
innumerable, wholly unwarranted by right reason, pure religion, 
the Bible, or the God of the Bible. Before the high and holy and 
puissant intelligences of earth and heaven this state of things is 
most intolerable. I have for some five and twenty years regarded 
creeds as both cause and effect of partyism and the main perpetuat- 
ing cause of schism, and have remonstrated and inveighed against 
them. Not like many, who oppose creeds because they first oppose 
their peculiar tenets, we oppose them on their own demerits, and 
not because they oppose us. In this particular, at least, if on no 
other account, we differ from the great majority of those who 
oppose them, because parties were sustained by them, because they 
made new parties, and because they were roots of bitterness and 
apples of discord, we opposed them. 

Mr. Campbell then turned for a moment, to the construc- 
tive and substitutionary side of his proposition: 

In lieu of them we tender the book that God gave us. We re- 
gard the Lord Jesus Christ as King, Lord, Lawgiver and Prophet 
of the church, and well qualified by the power of the Holy Spirit, 
to give us all a perfect volume — one in substance and form exactly 
adapted as he would have it for just such a family as the great 
family of man; we believe the Lord Jesus was wiser and more 
benevolent than all his followers in their united wisdom and benev- 
olence, and that as he could and would give them such a book as 
they needed. It is both the light of salvation and the bond of 
union amongst the saved. We abjure creeds simply as substitutes — 
directly or indirectly, substitutes — for the book of inspiration. In 
other respects we have no objection whatever to any people pub- 
lishing their tenets or views or practices to the world. I have no 
more objection to writing my opinions than to speaking them. 

His affirmative that "Human creeds as bonds of union and 
communion are necessarily heretical and schismatical/' was 
made perfectly clear by these definite statements. The docu- 
mentation of religious ideas and theological opinions for ex- 
planatory and propagandist uses, was quite innocuous, if not 



Human Creeds and Christian Union 225 

entirely harmless. The Reformers abjured these documents 
only when they were turned into authoritative symbols, 
hardened into finalities, and made terms of communion, bonds 
of union, tests of fellowship, and conditions of membership 
in the church. The personality of Jesus of Nazareth, which 
includes his nature, his character, and his ideals, they regarded 
as the creed of Christianity, the object of faith, the thing to 
be believed; the inspired writings of apostles and prophets as 
the rule of faith and morals, and the means of spiritual edi- 
fication. Mr. Campbell further said in the connection from 
which I have just quoted: 

We preach in the words of that book the gospel as promulgated 
by the apostles in Jerusalem. We use in all important matters the 
exact words of inspiration. We command all men to believe, to re- 
pent, to bring forth fruits worthy of reformation. We enjoin the same 
good words commanded by the Lord and by his apostles. We re- 
ceive men of all denominations under heaven, of all sects and 
parties, who will make the good confession on which Jesus Christ 
builded his church. We propound that confession of the faith in 
the identical words of inspiration, so that they who avow it ex- 
press a divine faith and build upon a consecrated foundation — a 
well tried corner stone. On a sincere confession of this faith we 
immerse all persons, and then present them with God's own book 
as their book of faith, piety, and morality. This is our most ob- 
noxious offense against the partyism of this age. 

The arguments used against human creeds as bonds of 
union and tests of fellowship, as standards of ministerial 
worthiness, and conditions of church membership may be 
briefly summarized at this point: 

1. Human creeds are without divine authority. God commanded 
no one to make them, no one to write them, and no church to 
receive them. 

2. They always have a tendency in time of defection to cast out 
the good, the intelligent, the pure, and to retain those of a contrary 
opinion. They retain the lees and rack off the pure wine. They 
killed the Savior, the apostles, the prophets, the saints, and the 
non-conformists of all ages, since the days of Daniel the prophet. 

3. They have generally been intolerant, proscriptive, and over- 
bearing. (This Mr. Campbell declared, needed no demonstration.) 



226 Debates That Made History 

4. They usurp legislative and juridic functions that belong right- 
fully to Christ and the Holy Spirit. They are treasonable attempts 
to dethrone the liege king, lawgiver and prophet of the church. 

5. Human creeds are divinely prohibited by several precepts of 
holy scripture, such as: ''Hold fast the form of sound words, which 
you have heard from me;'* "Contend earnestly for the faith once 
delivered to the saints;" "Hold fast the traditions which you have 
heard from us, whether by word or by our epistle;" "This is my 
beloved son, hear ye him." 

6. Stress was laid upon the important fact that the interval be- 
tween the death of the apostles and the beginning of the third 
century, was the purest, and most harmonious, united, prosperous, 
and happy period of the church, when it had no creed whatever 
but the apostolic writings. 

7. These creeds necessarily became constitutions of churches, and 
as such, embody and perpetuate the elements of Schism from gener- 
ation to generation. 

8. By attaching the mind to party shibboleths they detach it 
from a free and unconstrained consecration of itself to the whole 
truth of God's book. They put religious emphasis in the wrong 
place. They emphasize intellectual opinions and dogmas more than 
spiritual life and moral character. They stop growth by making 
it the worst of crimes to grow. 

9. Creeds are unfavorable to spirituality. By presenting truth 
in the cold, anatomical, formulary outlines of speculative propriety, 
they call for a mere intellectual eflFort of the understanding, and 
touch not the moral feelings of the heart. 

10. They have been always and everywhere hostile to reforma- 
tion and to all progress by putting out of the synagogue godly 
and intelligent ministers of religion. All of the great reformers and 
-prophets of the ivorld have been excommunicated persons. No 
eminent religious reformer has ever been permitted to exercise his 
ministry in the church in which he commenced. Slaves of creeds 
and hounds of the Lord never let up in their furious drives till 
every growing man in their obscurantist Israel is driven out. 

11. But the most serious limitation of these man-made ecclesi- 
astic documents, called creeds, is that they hopelessly block the way 
to Christian union. The exponents and devotees of sectarian creeds 
cannot convert each other to common ground, nor can they in their 
divisive and separated capacities, convert the world to any one 
of their creeds, much less to Jesus Christ who, by his saving and 
unifying power, makes all human creeds unnecessary. 



Human Creeds and Christian Union 227 

Other reasons were given, but these are sufficient to give 
us an idea of the forces liberated in that discussion seventy- 
seven years ago, w^hich for the most part in our day have 
turned these manufactured articles of faith, and wooden wares 
of opinion into the innocuous desuetude of utter harmlessness. 
Perhaps the best summary of the argument against creeds, and 
for the Bible as a sufficient rule of faith and practice, was 
made by one of the greatest of Mr. CampbelFs students, 
viz: 

If a creed contains more than the Bible it contains too much; if 
it contains less than the Bible it contains too little; if it contains 
anything different from the Bible it is wrong; if it contains what 
the Bible contains, neither more nor less, nor anything different, it 
is not a creed, but the Bible. 

It is quite needless for me to say, in view of all that has 
gone before, that Mr. Rice made no direct assault on these 
positions, so ably presented, amplified, and illustrated by his 
opponent. He dug in all right, and was by no means a bad 
sniper, but he seldom went over the top, to make a drive. 
As we have already seen, his method was not so much to dig 
in, as to dig under. He undertook to pull down the argu- 
mentative structure of his opponent by sapping and running 
something in the style of a California gopher. His objective, 
in this instance, was to make it appear that the creedlessness 
of the Reformers, under the leadership of Mr. Campbell, was 
not a workable hypothesis in the practical politics of the 
church. Having no authoritative creed or standard of doc- 
trine to provide material to put a fence around his principles, 
to wall them in and distinguish them from the princples of 
other churches he had organized a new cave of Addulam, in- 
dwelt, according to his own admission, by "all sorts of men 
teaching all sorts of doctrine." All of Mr. Campbell's 
writings and the literature of the reformation as a whole, had 
been canvassed and ransacked to find contradictions and dif- 
ferences of these reforming sinnners against themselves. These 



228 Debates That Made History 

differences of opinion, among the Reformers, he rolled as a 
sweet morsel under his defaming tongue. 

Mr. Campbell had labored faithfully to prove the doctrine 
of baptism for the remission of sins. Dr. Fishback denied it. 
Dr. Fishback held the doctrine of total hereditary depravity. 
Mr. Campbell and Dr. Shannon denied it, and Alylett 
Rains, another great preacher of the movement, said, "It is 
a libel on human nature of the grossest kind.'* Dr. Shannon 
believed that the scriptures are adequate to the conversion of 
men without any super-added spiritual influence. Mr. Rains 
did not believe it. After the conversion of Rains to the ref- 
ormation he still maintained his old opinion of universal sal- 
vation. "And so it goes'* said Mr. Rice. He had already 
dwelt at length on the defection of the notorious Dr. Thomas, 
who openly taught that man was composed of body, blood 
and breath, that Adam was God, the Holy Spirit electricity, 
and the Kingdom of God a politico-materialistic institution, to 
be entered by immersion regeneration, and "bossed" in the 
Millennium by his disciples, the Christadelphians. Barton W. 
Stone was represented as denying the divinity of Chirst, an 
old misrepresentation, but falser than old. 

Mr. Rice apparently had no consciousness of the fact, not 
even when Mr. Campbell pointed it out to him, that these 
charges were the highest compliments that could be paid to 
the reformation. In the debate on baptism Mr. Campbell 
was charged with narrowness and illiberality ; in the debate 
on creeds with latitudinarianism. He pleaded guilty to the 
charge of being liberal and broad enough to give latitude and 
leeway to differences of opinion and interpretation, in matters 
not affecting the essentials of life and salvation. These varia- 
tions of mental attitude towards theological problems, and 
speculations of the schools, had no disturbing or disruptive in- 
fluence on the brotherhood of the Reformers, whose distin- 
guishing mark was an effort to keep the unity of the Spirit in 



Human Creeds and Christian Union 229 

the bonds of peace. Mr. Campbell took occasion to say em- 
phatically at an early stage of this discussion on creeds: 

It is not the object of our efforts to make men think alike on a 
thousand themes. Let them think as they like on any matters of 
human opinion and upon doctrines of religion, provided only they 
hold the Head Christ, and keep his commandments. I have learned 
not only the theory, but the fact, that if you wish opinionism to 
cease or subside you must not call up and debate everything that 
men think or say. You may debate anything into consequence, or, by 
a dignified silence, you may waste it into oblivion. 

As to Thomas, M.D., his materialistic and horrible theories 
of God, man, and the devil, theology, prophecy, and eschatol- 
ogy, brought up as evidence of looseness of belief among the 
Disciples, and proof of the necessity for a creed in order to the 
detection and exposure of errorists; on the contrary, as was 
pointed out, the repudiation of Welch Thomas and his her- 
esies, by the Reformers, was in reality, clear proof of the 
sufficiency of the scriptures for **reproof" and for **correc- 
tion,'' as well as for ^'instruction in righteousness." 

Mr. Rice made a point against unwritten creeds and their 
exclusiveness, which seems at the first glance to have been 
well taken, as against his opponent's theology. He said: 

But facts prove, beyond contradiction, that churches having no 
written creed, may be, and are, as exclusive and sectarian as any 
other, and as much disposed to force their opinions on others. The 
gentleman's own church affords us evidence, conclusive, of the truth 
of this remark; for without a written creed they have excommuni- 
cated more Christians than any creed in Christendom! There is 
no other Protestant denomination as exclusive as they. 

The first part of this indictment is very true as a general 
proposition; but the Reformers against whom he inveighs in 
this soft impeachment, believed that Christians, and all Chris- 
tians, were in the church, and that neither men nor angels, 
nor devils had either the right or the power, to put one of 
them out, or to keep them out. An unwritten human creed 
is little, if any better, than a written one; in fact they are 
about equally obstructive and worthless, if they contain noth- 



230 Debates That Made History 

ing but theological opinions and speculations, but the unwrit- 
ten creed of Mr. CampbelFs church, to which Mr. Rice refers, 
was not an unwritten creed or rule of faith and practice; it 
was written, and very much written ; written a long time ago, 
on parchment and vellum by inspired penmen, and bound up 
in a volume for our use, known as the New Testament 
Scriptures. This creed includes some things and excludes 
others ; it includes some people and excludes others ; but neither 
the function of inclusion, nor of exclusion belongs to us, only 
the function of submission and realization comes our way. 
Perhaps the best conclusiofi of a discussion on the creed ques- 
tion is the following **creed for the times'* which is a very 
striking and beautiful interpretation of the conception of re- 
ligion advocated by Mr. Campbell in all his debates, especially 
in the last proposition of the last one, stripped of its outward 
dogmatic garb, which it then had to wear ; 

I believe in one God, present in nature as life and law; in 
science as truth, in art as beauty, in history as justice, in society 
as sympathy, in conscience as duty, and supremely in Christ as our 
highest ideal. 

I believe in the Bible as the expression of God's will through 
man, in prayer as the devotion of man's will to God; and in the 
church as the fellowship of those who try to do God's will in the 
world. 

I believe in worship as the highest inspiration to work; in sacri- 
fice as the price we must pay to make right what is wrong; in 
salvation as growth out of selfishness into service ; in eternal life 
as the survival of what loves and is lovable in each individual ; 
and in judgment as the obvious fact that the condition of the 
gentle, the generous, the modest, the pure, and the true is always 
and ever5^where preferable to that of the cruel, the sensual, the 
mean, the proud and the false. 



CHAPTER XXII 

CAMPBELL-RICE DEBATE CONCLUDED 

Last of the Big Five. "'Which Whipped f' The Question 
Settled by the Indian Method of Counting Scalps. Debates 
as Contributions to Christian Union. 



Protestant England and Protestant America have, at 
their disposal, all the means necessary to send the 
gospel from pole to pole, and from the Thames or the 
Euphrates to the ends of the earth. They have men 
enough; genius, learning, talent, ships, books, money, 
enterprise, zeal, adequate to such a splendid scheme; 
if they would, in Christian faith and purity, unite in 
one holy eflfort, on the book of God, to humanize, civ- 
ilize, and evangelize all the brotherhood of man. The 
unholy warfare of this age is inter-national, inter- 
sectional, inter-partizan. All the artillery — intellectual, 
moral, physical, is expended upon the little citadels, 
fortifications, and towers of partyism. It is a barbar- 
ous, uncivil, savage warfare against our own religion, 
against ourselves, against the common Savior, against 
the whole family of man. 

For all these reasons, I pray for the annihilation of 
partyism, and of everything that, directly or indirectly, 
tends to keep it up ; and instead of these human devices, 
of which I have so often spoken, these ordinances and 
traditions of men, I plead for the Bible, and nothing 
but the Bible, f as the standard and rule of all our per- 
sonal and social duties; our bond of union, our terms 
of communion, the directory and formulary of our 
whole church relations — faith, discipline, and govern- 
ment. — Alexander CampbelL 



I close this discussion with the kindest feelings to- 
wards my opponent and his friends. My prayer is, 
that God, in his mercy, will hasten the day, when true 
Christian union — unity of the faith and in the knowl- 
edge of the Son of God, may universally prevail ; when 
all the disciples of Christ shall be more nearly alike, 
and shall be able, more harmoniously and efficiently to 
co-operate in spreading over the earth the knowledge 
of the glorious Gospel ; when they will present to the 
powers of darkness an unbroken phalanx. May all 
who bear the Christian name, build on the Rock of 
Ages, that they may be able to stand, when the earth 
shall be shaken to its centre. — N. L. Rice. 



CHAPTER XXII 

CAMPBELL-RICE DEBATE CONCLUDED 

THIS debate in Lexington was the supreme effort of Cal- 
vinistic paedobaptists, in that community, to break the 
influence and stop the progress of the religious reformation, 
led by Alexander Campbell, which was Baptist and Arminian 
in its theology. Under the trip hammer blows of Campbell 
and Stone, and a multitude of able preachers, won from its 
ranks, Calvinistic paedobaptism was visibly on the decline. 
Its intellectual and theological strongholds had been success- 
fully bombarded and it was about to capitulate to the opposi- 
tion. Something had to be attempted, something done, to 
save the cause of orthodox religion to Central Kentucky. Un- 
der this conviction, in the minds of its leaders, they took the 
aggressive and made this great drive in this battle of the gods. 
Stimulated by fear of their antagonist and the consciousness 
of peril to their cause, they made a desperate effort to manu- 
facture public opinion in its favor, both while the debate was 
going on, and after its close. 

While the discussion of the Holy Spirit was under way, 
Mr. Campbell, in his second address, took occasion to expose 
the unscrupulous propaganda that had been organized against 
him. After referring to similar tactics in the debate with Mr. 
McCalla, he said : 

On the present occasion, I learn a more extended system has been 
got up. Runners spread the tidings abroad — letters are written to 
distant places; even the Presbyterian press has proclaimed all over 
the land a glorious victory. To the old system more thoroughly 
carried out, has, in this age of the march of the mind, been added 
a new invention. True, indeed, something like it in days of yore, 
seems to have occurred at Drury Lane and other London theatres, 
when some new actor was about to make his debut. In order to 

233 



234 Debates That Made History 

stimulate his energies, and to manufacture fame, a few friends were 
placed in the galleries above, with a previous understanding when 
to clap, express their plaudits, and to encore his performances. As 
an improvement, I learn a laughing committee has been organized 
w^ith a clerical bugleman, at whose signal certain persons are to 
smile a little broad, and thus encourage my worthy friend! I 
have, indeed, in these particulars, been somewhat disappointed. My 
paedobaptist friends have rather gone ahead of all my past ex- 
periences and expectations. 

Two years after the oral debate, when the Presbyterians 
were still boasting of a great victory Mr. Campbell published 
the following in the Millennial Harbinger, which was cer- 
tainly a better test of victory than the foolish tactics he had 
exposed while the debate was in progress. 

An occurrence at Nashville sets this argument in a fair light. 
I once had a public talk there with the late Obadiah Jennings, D.D., 
which Presbyterians manufactured into a great debate, in which of 
course, I was, as usual, gloriously defeated. The city rang with 
Presbyterial acclamations for some ten days; when an aged citizen 
accosted one of the boasters in the following st>'le: "You Presby- 
terians have gained, you say, a glorious victory. How do you know 
when you have gained a victory? I do not understand how you 
ascertain a victory? Do tell me how you know when you beat? 
I will tell you how, in old times, we counted victories when I was 
engaged in Indian wars. After the battle was over we counted the 
scalps. Those were said to have conquered who could count the 
largest number of scalps taken from the enemy. Now, since Mr. 
Campbell has been here, he has immersed some thirty, amongst 
whom were the most intelligent citizens of Nashville. How many 
have you added to your church by this debate?" "I have not heard 
of any," said his Presbyterian friend. "Pray then, my dear sir, tell 
me, how you know when you have gained a great victory?" 

Boasts of this kind, by heated partizans, amount to nothing, 
unless ^'scalps" come in to make good the claim. It had passed 
into a sarcasm, if not into a joke, that each side to a contro- 
versy, is absolutely certain that the other side is in the wrong. 
Of course, men would not be men, and human nature would 
be some other kind of nature, if this were not so. Scalps, as 
tangible tokens and signs of victory, were not confined to In- 



I 



Campbell-Rice Debate Concluded 235 

dian wars — a metaphorical application of the term to con- 
verts from the other side, and conviction carried to the dis- 
interested intelligence of the community outside w^as the stand- 
ard of success in a public debate, and this visible test of the 
acid variety, invariably followed the debates of Alexander 
Campbell, and most others held by his brethren. Notably in 
this debate with Rice, **scalps" piled up around the feet of 
his opponent while the conflict was still raging. When Mr. 
Campbell preached on the interval Sundays, numbers of per- 
sons presented themselves for baptism. Amongst these a well 
known Lutheran minister, named McChestney, who was the 
graduate of a college, and also of a paedobaptist theological 
seminary, situated, by the way, on what became the battle field 
of Gettysburg, the decisive battle of our Civil War. Mr. 
Rice made little of this occurrence by representing that Mr. 
McChestney had been convinced before and saved up for the 
occasion, to help his opponent out of a hard place. Brother 
McChestney, who became a prominent preacher and pastor 
among the Disciples, sent up this note which Mr. Campbell 
read to the audience. 

I never said that I had not changed my course on the subject of 
infant baptism since I have been here. Many of the sentiments 
held by the advocates of the reformation I have long held and 
taught; but on the subject of infant baptism, I have changed my 
course since I have been here, and in consequence of this debate. 

Partizanship, however blind, is always sincere. There is no 
doubt about the sincerity of the Presbyterian belief in the 
certainty that their cause had triumphed, as shown by the 
eagerness with which the Rev. J. H. Brown, the man who 
held the long correspondence with Mr. Campbell arranging 
the propositions to be discussed, purchased for $2000 the copy- 
right of the printed debate, and, in the efforts made, for some 
time, to circulate it. As to the outcome of the strenuosity 
of Presbyterians to give the work an adequate circulation, a 
contemporary, familiar with the facts thus testifies : 



236 Debates That Made History 

It was soon found, however, that the effect of the printed dis- 
cussion upon the public mind was quite diflFerent, from what the 
party expected, and they were mortified to perceive that it was 
making many converts to Mr. Campbell's views, but none to Presby- 
terianism. Upon this Mr. Brown gladly disposed of his copyright, 
for a small sum, to a member of the Christian Church at Jackson- 
ville, 111., C. D. Roberts, who immediately printed a large edition 
of the work, which has been since patronized and circulated by the 
Reformers. Results have shown that whatever personal distinction 
or notoriety the debate may have given to Mr. Rice, it certainly added 
nothing to Presbyterianism, which, in Kentucky continued still to 
decline, while that of the Reformation steadily prospered. 

This bulky volume of more than 900 pages, notwithstand- 
ing the scholastic and critical character of a portion of its con- 
tents, was extensively read and intensively influential in settling 
the issues in dispute, in thinking circles. The facts and argu- 
ments were repeated in hundreds of debates, oral and written, 
throughout the English speaking world, and in numberless 
sermons, adding hundreds of churches, and thousands of con- 
verts to the cause of Reformation ; and paradoxical, as it may 
sound, made a fundamental and far-reaching contribution to 
the cause of peace and Christian union. 

Errors and obstacles in the way of unity, received a fatal 
blow in this decisive battle, and as in the case of all other 
decisive conflicts, time, and many other engagements were re- 
quired, to bring home the fact to the dull and slow-moving 
consciousness of the people at large. Only a few individual 
instances, out of many, can be given here, as specimen con- 
verts, by reading the debate. Col. Thos. H. Nelson, formerly 
United States minister to Mexico, and afterward to Chili, said 
at Terre Haute, Ind., in 1888. 

I was a young lawyer at Lexington, Ky., and attended the Camp- 
bell and Rice debates. I was a Presbyterian. When I heard the 
debate I thought Mr. Rice got the better of Mr. Campbell; I pur- 
chased the debate when published, and have since decided that 
Mr. Campbell was a giant beside the ordinary Mr. Rice. Even now 
when I want an intellectual stimulus I take down *'the Campbell 
and Rice Debate" and read Mr. Campbell's masterful arguments. 



Campbell-Rice Debate Concluded 237 

A Mrs. Postlethwaite, of Greensburg, Pa., a woman of 
culture and calibre and undoubted moral fibre, after reading 
the book three times went from the closed book to the open 
baptistry, and, by the authority of the Lord Christ, was im- 
mersed into the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. 
Her case was an extraordinary one. She was the relict of Dr. 
Postlethwaite, an elder of high repute in the Presbyterian 
Church, of which she herself had been a member in good 
standing and full fellowship for more than fifty years. Her 
environment was as inimical to an unprejudiced reading, as 
her biased mental attitude at the beginning. She was at 
the home of her son-in-law, a Presbyterian clergyman, with 
all her associations orthodox, of a peculiarly rigid type of cur- 
rent Presbyterianism. After the first reading she felt that 
Mr. Rice had sustained himself fairly well but wondered why 
he had not answered Mr. Campbell's arguments in a more 
satisfactory way than he seemed able to do. A second reading 
brought the conviction that his arguments had not been an- 
swered because they were not answerable. She laid down the 
book at the end of the third reading ashamed and disgusted 
at the disingenuousness and unfairness of Rice, with the un- 
shakable conviction, doubly confirmed, that one side was con- 
tending for important truths and the other for moth grown 
human institutions and traditions. 

In 1846 Mr. Campbell received a letter from an intelligent 
official of the Methodist church in Nashville, and this also is 
a very remarkable instance. Said he: 

I commenced to read the debate between you and Rev. N. L. 
Rice, some twelve months ago, with prejudices decidedly, for the 
most part, in favor of the views entertained by the latter, but by 
the time I had finished I was fully convinced that Mr. Rice had 
utterly failed to sustain his positions. Yet I was not fully satisfied 
that the doctrine for which you contended was true. It was a clear 
case, to my mind, that your arguments, for the most part, were con- 
clusive — that you had gained a complete triumph over Mr. Rice ; but 
yet I was fearful that your premises might somewhere be defective, 



238 Debates That Made History 

and, to be honest, I had a kind of a secret wish that it might be so! 
I did not, some how or other, like, after living in the Methodist 
Episcopal Church for some fourteen years, sustaining too, as I did 
an official relation to that church, to give up my long cherished 
opinions. Still, I determined, after making a fair test of your 
views, to fall upon the side of the truth, should it even be what I 
was pleased, in common with many others, to call ^'Campbellism." 
I, therefore, with earnest inquiry after God's revealed truth, fled 
to the Bible, and read it with greater care and solicitude, if possible, 
than I had ever done before. The result of this was a confirmation 
of my already partial conviction of the truth of your position. I 
found that what I had supposed to be Campbellism was God's own 
revealed truth. Under this conviction, about the 24th of last May, 
in Franklin County, Kentucky, I was immersed, after which I became 
a member of the Christian Church. Is not my case, with many 
others similar, a demonstration of the (Shall I say?) omnipotence 
of truth? When I commenced reading the debate, to which I have 
alluded, my prejudices were unreasonable against yourself, and what 
I then considered exclusively your doctrine; but the truth — the un- 
sophisticated truth, as contended for by yourself and confirmed by 
the Bible — proved sufficiently strong to conquer that monster preju- 
dice. 

But the ^^scalp'* that gave to Mr. Campbell, the greatest 
personal satisfaction was that of his uncle Archibald Campbell 
of Newry, Ireland, several of w^hose children who had emi- 
grated to the United States, and had fallen in line with the 
reformatory views of their illustrious cousin. Amongst these 
was the well known Enos Campbell, a man of high standing 
as teacher and advocate of the reformation. The father Arch- 
bald continued to maintain his Presbyterian sentiments, and 
to act as an elder of the Presbyterian sesession church at 
Newry, an office he had filled for more than fifty years. At 
length in May, 1846, he thus wrote to his nephew Alexander: 

I read your debate with Mr. Rice, through the medium of your 
Dungannon friends. I consider him a much more wily antagonist 
than either McCalla or Walker. I would not be surprised if the 
popular cry would be in his favor. He seems to have the tact of 
making the most of everything that might appear in his favor. * * 
But, notwithstanding his ingenuity and wiles I am constrained to 
give up infant baptism as being apostolical. 



Campbell-Rice Debate Concluded 239 

Mr. Campbell in commenting on the letter said this: 

Coming from such a source from one who has often, during 
twenty years, objected to my views on this subject and corresponded 
with me in defense, not only of infant baptism, but of the difFer- 
ential peculiarities of Presbyterians, and one of the most learned 
and influential elders of that church in the North of Ireland — I re- 
gard as a very great triumph. Such a man's testimony with me, 
weighs more than many thousands. 

At the time of this debate the Presbyterian Church, in Ken- 
tucky, numbered 8,000 members and 80 ministers. The Re- 
formers — the combined forces of Campbell and Stone — only 
ten or twelve years old as a separate movement — had 40,000 
members and a corresponding number of preachers. It was 
the superb ability and preternatural activity of these Reform- 
ers, as spiritual scalp takers, that brought on the decisive battle 
of this ecclesiastical v/ar. The combined Calvinism and paedo 
baptism of the Presbyterians caused them to be pre-eminent 
scalp losers of the crisis in that period of religious and polemic 
history. The debate, as we have seen, made bad matters much 
worse for them. The decline continued at a more rapid pace 
than before, and in less than a quarter of a century, the great 
and flourishing and influential Transylvania University, passed 
to the Reformers, and ever since, has been the strongest center 
in the world of reformation and Christian union propaganda. 

The first efi[ects of a debate, like the immediate consequences 
of a battle, seem to be bad and only bad. When Wolfe scaled 
the heights of Quebec, at the cost of his own life, and that of 
the commander in chief on the other side, and thousands of 
both armies lay stretched on the fields of blood, there were 
no mitigating circumstances, apparently, between the tragic 
situation and the lower regions. But that sanguinary strug- 
gle, on these Canadian heights, made the United States a 
Protestant nation, and the new civilization safe for democracy. 
Waterloo and Gettysburg, in their first results, were unmis- 
takable irruptions from the pit; but in the long view, the 
first dated a new birth for civilization in Europe, and the last 



240 Debates That Made History 

marked the preservation of the American Union, and the 
emancipation of four million slaves. 

These religious debates of which I have been writing, and 
others like them, appeared in a short view to make bad mat- 
ters worse. As a first result, instead of doing away with 
creeds, lessening sectarianism, mitigating prejudice, bigotry, 
and fanaticism, all were intensified and multiplied. The com- 
munity was set by the ears, and the two parties, for months 
after the debate, to avoid meeting their neighbors and former 
friends face to face, walked on opposite sides of the street. 
But time and the providence of God have worked wonders, 
in the matter of these old dogmatic tests of a Christian. 
When these disputatious peoples, after their fierce theological 
set-tos, had a little time to cool off, they commenced to think 
— and people will not think until they are bumped and jarred 
into it — they were driven to reflection and investigation. 
They went, perforce, to their Bibles, like our Methodist 
friend, just mentioned. When you can get a man into 
the Book as an earnest seeker after truth, you can safely leave 
the consequences to take care of themselves. He will come 
out at the right place. These good Presbyterian people, as 
we have already had occasion to note, who fought so bit- 
terly and fiercely for their denominational creed, in the great 
debate with Alexander Campbell have been the first people to 
revise their creed, and they have practically revised its ob- 
jectionable features out of existence and into harmony with 
the universal love of God, preached by Campbell and Stone 
in days of yore. And, still more marvelous to relate, these 
people who resisted Mr. Campbell's conception of organic 
Christian union to the last ditch in the battle of Lexington, 
have been the first to get there, in fact they have beaten Mr. 
Campbell's own people to it! Thus debates, which seemed 
at first to be the greatest of possible hindrances to the unity 
of the people of God, have turned out in the long view to be 
the greatest of its providential helpers. 



CHAPTER XXIII 
AFTERMATH OF THE GREAT DEBATES 

The Friendly Personal Relations between Alexander Camp- 
bell and His Two Greatest Opponents, Robert Owen and 
Bishop Pur cell. 



Should I find a paedobaptist more intelligent in the 
Christian Scriptures, more spiritually-minded and more 
devoted to the Lord than a Baptist, or one immersed 
on a profession of the ancient faith, I could not hesi- 
tate a moment in giving the preference of my heart to 
him that loveth most. Did I act otherwise, I would be 
a pure sectarian, a Pharisee among Christians. Still 
I will be asked. How do I know that anyone loves my 
Master but by his obedience to his commandment? I 
answer. In no other way. But mark, I do not substi- 
tute obedience to one commandment, for universal or 
even for general obedience. And should I see a sec- 
tarian Baptist or a paedobaptist more spiritually- 
minded, more generally conformed to the requisitions 
of the Messiah, than one who precisely acquiesces with I 

me in the theory or practice of immersion as I teach, 
doubtless the former rather than the latter, would have 
my cordial approbation and love as a Christian. So 
I judge, and so I feel. It is the image of Christ the 
Christian looks for and loves; and this does not con- 
sist in being exact in a few items, but in general devo- 
tion to the whole truth as far as known. 
— Alexander Campbell, in the famous "Lunenburg Let- 
ter:' 



I 



CHAPTER XXIII 
AFTERMATH OF THE GREAT DEBATES 

THE warmth of friendship and mutual appreciation of 
the great disputants, after the debates, was in inverse 
ratio of their differences. The nearer together in convictions 
concerning the fundamentals, the farther apart in friendly re- 
lations afterwards. The more widely sundered in opinions 
and principles, the closer together in ties of personal friend- 
ship. This is a strange fact, from the point of view of Chris- 
tian idealism, but a familiar phenomenon to students of psy- 
chology. If Mr. Campbell and his three evangelical oppo- 
nents had any kind of regard or affection or kindly apprecia- 
tion of each other, it does not appear in the records of history, 
as far as my knowledge extends. But the way Mr. Campbell 
and his other two opponents, the infidel and the Roman 
Catholic, spoke of their regards for each other, is one of the 
most touching and beautiful things in human history. 

In 1847, four years after the debate with Rice, when Mr. 
Campbell was passing through New York on his way to Eng- 
land, he was much gratified by a call from Robert Owen, 
who, with the most perfect courtesy and kind feeling, in- 
quired after Mr. Campbell's family, and particularly after 
his father, for whom he had a peculiar regard. In speaking 
of the interview, Mr. Campbell remarked, as he had done on 
many occasions before, that "of all his opponents in debate 
the infidel Robert Owen, was the most candid, fair, and 
gentlemanly disputant he had ever met.'' As this was the 
last time he ever saw Mr. Owen it may be here stated that 
the latter afterward finally returned to England, and, as re- 
lated in a biographical sketch published after his death, con- 

243 



244 Debates That Made History . 

I 
tinued to be noted for his amiability, being still as has been 

written of him: 

The same placid happy being, in his old age, believing and ex- 
pecting whatever he wished ; always gentlemanly and courteous in 
his manners ; always on the most endearing terms with his children, 
who loved to make him, as they said, "the very happiest old man 
in the world," always a gentle love in regard to his dogmas and 
bis expectations; always palpably right in his descriptions of human 
misery; always thinking he had proved a thing when he had as- 
serted it in the force of his own convictions; always meaning some- 
thing more rational than he had actually expressed. It was said 
by way of mockery, that he might live in a parallelogram, but he 
argued in circles, but this is too favorable a description of one who 
did not argue at all, nor know what argument meant. His mind 
never fairly met any other, though at the close of his life he had a 
strange idea that it did by means of spirit rappings. He published 
sundry conversations held in that way with Benjamin Franklin and 
other people, and in the very same breath in which he insisted on 
the reality of these conversations he insisted that the new found 
power was "all electricity." He lived until his 89th year and died 
in November, 1857, at Newton, in Wales, the place of his birth to 
which he had gone on a visit. 

But the world was not done with good and gentle Robert 
Owen. He came back from the other side and had his pic- 
ture "took." Alfred Russell Wallace, coadjutor with Dar- 
win in the discovery and development of the law of natural 
selection, and a more brilliant man than Darwin, in his re- 
m.arkable book on Miracles and Modern Spiritualism tells 
the story of materialization and spirit photography of which 
he was an eye witness. At a seance, held in London, about 
ten years after the death of Robert Owen, a well known 
photographer of the city being present with his photographic 
apparatus, the medium pointed to a small table in the room, 
and said there are two old men standing there. They were 
not visible to the spectators. The photographer pointed his 
camera in the direction indicated, took a snap shot, which 
when the negative was developed, turned out to be two ex- 
cellent likenesses of Lord Brougham and Robert Owen, rec- 



Aftermath of the Great Debates 245 

ognized and identified by all present who had known these 
gentlemen in life. Russell Wallace the great man of science 
declares that these pictures were still in existence when his 
book was written, in the early seventies. So that Mr. Camp- 
bell's good old friend, under the leadership of his brilliant 
son Robert Dale Owen, not only gave up his atheism and 
materialism, and died, not in the sure and certain hope of im- 
mortality, but in the sure and certain knowledge, as he be- 
lieved, of the great life beyond. 

The Christian-Evangelist of September, 1898 published a 
remarkable interview with Archbishop Purcell, by a writer 
who signs himself "I. C." Recently in the office of the paper, 
all the available forces, with the writer, put our heads to- 
gether to cipher out the identity of the author, but we failed. 
However, in conversation with J. H. McNeil, pastor of the 
Christian Church at Winchester, Ky., where these lines are 
written, by dint of his knowledge and a little higher criticism, 
the problem, I believe, was solved. The highly interesting 
conversation that follows, took place between Gov. Ira D. 
Chase, of Indiana, who was also a Christian preacher, and 
Archbishop Purcell, the Holy See having trans-mogrified the 
Bishop Purcell who debated with Alexander Campbell into 
Archbishop Purcell, as a reward for his services in defending 
the Holy Mother Church. Governor Chase was a past master 
of this kind of reporting, and always signed his interviews 
"I. C." These are marvellous words spoken by the Arch- 
bishop and lead us to say if there are many Purcells in the 
Roman church, who hold this conception of the Christian 
religion; who thus discriminate between the accidental and 
the essential elements of Christianity, the reunion of Christen- 
dom, including Rome is now within the sphere of practical 
politics. This is what was said: 

After the conversation had run on In this manner for some time, 
the idea occurred to me to talk to His Grace about Mr, Campbell. 
So I boldly broached the subject and said: ^'Bishop, I am aware 



246 Debates That Made History 

that you were once engaged in a debate with the greatest reformer 
of the nineteenth century, and one of the greatest men of any age." 

"Oh!" said he, "you allude to Mr. Campbell, of course." 

I said, "Yes, he is the man." 

"Now," I went on, **I have, Bishop, many friends in Mr. Camp- 
bell's church who are persons of sterling worth and noble character, 
who would like very much to hear your opinion of that gentleman, 
of his work and his place in the history of the Christian Church and 
amongst the intellectual giants of the Protestant Reformation." 

"Certainly,*' he responded, "I will gladly talk with you about 
my worthy friend, Mr. Campbell. From the very first day of our 
acquaintance to the day of his death, I always entertained the kind- 
liest feelings toward that gentleman. Oh! he was a most lovable 
character, indeed, and treated me in every way and on all occasions 
like a brother." Here the good man's eyes sparkled as he added: 

*'Was he not my brother in the Lord? Was he not like me a 
follower of the meek and lowly Jesus? Did he not believe in the 
resurrection of the dead and of the life beyond the grave where we 
shall meet to part no more? Did he not kneel before the same 
cross, in spirit and regard, with reverence the Mother of Jesus and 
that poor woman who bathed his feet with her tears and wiped 
them with the hairs of her head, and of those other sweet and pious 
women who followed the great Master in his journeyings over the 
classic hills of Judea and knelt beside his body when taken down 
from the cross and placed in his narrow tomb?" 

"It is true, we differed in some matters — for instance, on church 
government, prayers for the departed, confessions of sin to the 
priest, the celibacy of the clergy — what of that? These were all 
minor matters. In the essentials of Christianity we entirely agreed. 

"In Mr. Campbell's church the form of worship is very simple, 
as in the days of the apostles. He hoped always to keep it so. Here 
is where he was mistaken. It cannot be kept so. As the church be- 
comes great in numbers, and rich and strong, it will lose its original 
simplicity. This is inevitable. We begin to see the change already 
in some of the richer congregations in the cities. Are not the ad- 
vanced congregations already discarding congreg:ational sin.sjing, and 
procuring fine organs and hired choirs? Are they not placing soft 
and luxurious cushions in their seats, and placing flowers in the 
pulpits and in the altars? Has not fine stained glass found its way 
into the lofty windows of their truly Gothic cathedrals? Surely, all 
these things have taken place, and very shortly they'll have repre- 
sentation of the anostles and the saints in these same windows, and 
fine frescoed ceilings, with scenes from sacred Scriptures repre- 
sented thereon, as we have in the Sistine Chapel at Rome. 



Aftermath of the Great Debates 247 

"I do not think that the Christian Church will introduce into 
their worship our incense-throwing, or our scarlet robes, or many 
other things that are peculiar to the Church of Rome. We have 
been many centuries in introducing all these forms into our worship. 
The church of Mr. Campbell is not one hundred years old. It is 
yet in its infancy, and a very lively brat, it is, too! What forms 
it will adopt in its manner of worship in the future, what changes 
it will inaugurate in the next five hundred years, no one can tell. 
As I before intimated, the magnificant ritual of the Church of Rome 
has been the creation of ages and ages, until now it is as perfect, 
as imposing, and as impressive as it can possibly be made. 

**Now, in the Jewish Church the same struggle is going on be- 
tween the Reform Jews and the Orthodox. One represents the time 
of Moses and Joshua, the other modern civilization, science and 
progress. There is an irreconcilable conflict between these two 
wings of Judaism. Which will dominate? Of course, the more ad- 
vanced. It is a case of the survival of the fittest and the wisest. 
So in the Christian Church. One section is opposed to choirs, fine 
music, splendid churches. The other just the reverse. One I call 
the backwoods church, the other the church of progress and of high 
moral and aesthetic culture. Now, I contend that the church is 
drifting, drifting away from the apostolic simplicity of which its 
founder dreamed, and has joined in the race which all Protestant 
churches are making toward something grander and more majestic. 

*'Do not imagine that I am saying that the church is losing any 
of its distinctive features — any of its fundamental doctrines. It 
has merely added something to them to make them more elegant and 
more attractive." 

Said I, "Bishop, what do you think of the debate between Camp- 
bell and Rice?" 

"Oh, as to that," said he, '1 have never read the debate. It was 
very lengthy, you might say tedious. It ran through seventeen 
consecutive days, and each party claimed the victory, of course. 
One of the grand features of the debate was the presence of Henry 
Clay as a moderator. We Catholics felt no interest in the points at 
issue between these gentlemen. Take baptism, for instance, a sub- 
ject on which both churches were very much exercised. We Roman- 
ists believe in the great, essential, absolute importance of the holy 
rite of baptism. In our church it is a sacrament like marriage. 
Beyond this we don't go one step. We care nothing about the style 
of baptism or the manner of administering it. We sprinkle, we 
pour, we immerse. We do precisely what the person to be baptized 
insists on. We generally sprinkle because it is most convenient. 

"Pending the long debate between these two really great men my 
prayers were daily lifted up for Mr. Campbell. In his discussions 



248 Debates That Made History 

with our clergy he had always been kind, affable, courteous; Rice 
quite the reverse. One was a gentleman ; as to the other, what 
shall I say of him?'* 

*'Bishop, how about your debate with Campbell ?" 

"Well, that only lasted a few days. Everything was conducted in 
decency and order, as St. Paul would say. Campbell was decidedly 
the very fairest man in debate I ever saw, as fair as you can 
possibly conceive. He never fought for victory, like Dr. Johnson. 
He seemed to be always fighting for the truth, or what he believed 
to be the truth. In this he differed from other men. He never 
misrepresented his case nor that of his opponent; never tried to 
hide a weak point; never quibbled. He would have made a very 
poor lawyer, in the ordinary understanding of the term lawyer. 
Like his great friend, Henry Clay, he excelled in the clear state- 
ment of the case at issue. No dodging with him. He came right 
out fairly and squarely. He was what used to be called, in good 
old times, ^flat-footed.' Rather than force a victory by underhand 
or ignoble means, he preferred to encounter defeat. But whenever 
he fell, he fell like the Cavalier Bayard, with honor and a clear 
conscience. 

"In our debate not a particle of ill-feeling or bitterness was 
mixed up. After the discussions were over we would meet and be 
just as friendly as if we both belonged to one and the same church. 
Oh, how I should like to have met this dear son of God socially 
and in private life, after age had whitened our locks and mellowed 
our tempers and dispositions!" 

I said, "Bishop, what think you of his work?'* 

**Well," he said, "we Catholics do not think much of a church 
until it has existed fully a century. It must have passed its hun- 
dredth annual milestone. Hardly has this church seen its seventy- 
fifth birthday. But it is a lusty youth, and has certainly distanced 
all its rivals in the race for popular favor. Not even the Methodists, 
with their efficient itineracy and their sensational methods of wor- 
ship, can hold their own with the Christian Church in the fierce 
struggle for proselytes and for supremacy. I see no signs of weak- 
ness, of decay of decreptitude in this organization. Quite the con- 
trary. It appears to be gathering new hope and courage and 
strength with each successive decade. Should this progress continue 
for the next quarter of a century, who will say what gigantic 
proportions it will assume? It has already passed away beyond 
the wildest dreams and hopes and expectations of its founder. 

"Now as for Mr. Campbell's standing in future ages, I think 
it is quite within the bounds of truth to say that not ecclesiastical 
history alone, but profane history, will place him on the same 
pedestal with Luther and Calvin and Wesley, the peer of either 



Aftermath of the Great Debates 249 

of them. Had he lived in the early ages of Christendom and 
accomplished the wonderful amount of good with which he is justly 
credited he would after death have been sanctified and canonized 
and "enrolled in the calendar" along with St. Chrysostom and St. 
Jerome as a father in the church, his name forever embalmed in 
its annals as a worthy successor of St. Peter and St. Paul. But 
alas! he missed these high honors by being born too late in the 
history of the world and in a prosaic age when money and power 
are more valued than piety and goodness and greatness." 

The Hon. J. M. Sandusky, a lawyer of Liberty, Mo., who 
was born in the Blue Grass and educated in Kentucky Uni- 
versity, sends me a good point on Henry Clay as Moderator 
of the Campbell and Rice debate : 

I learned of Henry Clay^s presiding at the Campbell and Rice 
Debate a few years ago in B. Click's second hand book store at 
Kansas City. I picked up a volume, which I saw contained this 
debate, and opening the book at the first page, I saw that Henry 
Clay presided over the discussion along with Raccoon John Smith 
(it was Col. Speed Smith) and some other person I do not remember. 
I was impressed by the fact of Mr. Clay being chosen as presiding 
moderator, and Mr. Glick, who was a quaint and interesting char- 
acter, coming along about that time, I said to him, "Mr. Glick, this 
volume contains the religious debate between Alexander Campbell 
and Nathan L. Rice, and I see that Henry Clay was presiding 
moderator at the debate." *ls that so?" he said. *'Well," he con- 
tinued, "I should have thought Henry Clay could have made a much 
better judge of a horse race or good whiskey than a religious de- 
bate." 

There was a tradition that persisted to my day in Lexing- 
ton, to the effect that Henry Clay was immersed soon after the 
close of the debate. If this is so, and I have never seen it 
denied, then it follows that the great commoner was a better 
judge of religious debates than this gentleman would seem to 
have been willing to admit. 



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